66 Flowers and their Unbidden Guests. 



style. This style is of considerable size, and shaped 

 much like a clarionet. It is only the inner surface of 

 its funnel-shaped extremity that is stigmatic ; the outer 

 surface, on the other hand, is somewhat swollen, and 

 covered with a layer of viscid matter secreted by the 

 epiderm. The stronger kinds of flying insects, that have 

 a proboscis not less than 1 2 mm. in length, are in no 

 wise hampered by this viscid matter; for they can 

 insert their proboscis without harm between the viscid 

 ring and the closely applied petals, and so reach the 

 nectar below. These large insects, however, in so doing 

 and in flying from flower to flower, will carry pollen 

 with them and transfer it to the mature stigmas. 

 Creeping insects, on the contrary, as also the smaller 

 flying ones, whose visits would not conduce to this 

 desirable result, are caught by the viscid ring in 

 their attempt to purloin the nectar, are held fast, and 

 perish.^ 



Before bringing this chapter to an end, I must 

 record a very noteworthy observation, which I chanced 

 to make for the first time in the summer of last year. 

 With the view of watching the behaviour of woodUce, 

 insects, snails, etc., when on plants^ I placed such 

 animals in some cases half-way up the stem, in other 

 cases on the viscid rings, in others on the prickly or 



^ I found a small winged beetle Epurea silacea, as well as a 

 wingless ant, Leptothorax mascorum, sticking to the viscid ring of 

 Monotropa glabra Bernh. 



