MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 555 
I mentioned the incident in a letter home at the time, and in reply was in- 
formed, on the authority of the Parish Clerk, that it was a well-known fact 
that, if you cut an adder in two, the tail will follow the head. 
Also I found something like it in Lucretius, but the poet describes the head 
as going in search of the tail, and not the tail of the head, 
The experiment is easy of repetition, but one does not often get the oppor- 
tunity of pulling a lively snake in half, and there are obvious objections not 
only on the score of cruelty. 
Tt would be interesting if some of our naturalists have any lore on the gsub- 
ject to communicate. 
HK. J. EBDEN, I.CS. 
Camp, AHMEDNAGAR DisTRICT, 
1st March, 1894. 
No. VIII.—FERTILIZATION OF THE VANILLA FLOWER 
BY BEES. 
“ Autrefois l’clevage des abeilles constituait une industrie importante ; Cuba 
exportait alors de grandes quantités de miel dt de cire. Délaissé dans ce 
derniéres années, ce genre d’exploitation, encouragé par les demandes croissantes 
des consommateurs américains, reprend 4 nouveau et c’est par millions que se 
chiffre exportation aux Htats-Unis.” 
“Ce résultat en améne un autre. La reprise de l’apiculture 4 Cuba donne 
une impulsion vigoureuse 4 la culture du vanillier, Duranta plumiere, la 
fécondation artificielle devenant inutile, affirme-t-on, et les abeilles y suppléant. 
On s’est souvent demandé comment il se fait, alors que des capitaux immenseg 
sont engagés, en Chine et aux Indes, dans la culture du thé, que celle de la 
vanille, bien autrement lucrative, quoique d’une consommation autrement 
restreinte, attire si peu l’attention des planteurs. En gens pratiques, les 
Américains ont compris les grands benélices qu’elle pouvait donner aux 
Antilles, ott le sol et le climat sont des plus favorables 4 cette liane originaire 
du Mexique.” 
VII.—Le monde Antilien. II.—Cuba, Puerto-rico, par M. OC, de Varigny. 
Revue des Deux Mondes, 1st January, 1894, p. 185. 
For the benefit of members that do not happen to read French, I may say 
that the pith of the passage quoted from the Revwe des Deux Mondes is as 
follows :— 
Formerly the Cubans, like other Vanilla cultivators in many tropical coun- 
tries, had to fertilize their Vanilla flowers by hand, because the plant, an exotic 
orchid, depends in its native country for fertilization on an insect that no one 
had managed to induce to follow the plantiacross'seas, 
