Jury, 1914.] THE ORCHID REVIEW. 195 
In trying to get some idea of what a flower is, and what vegetables 
mean when regarded from the non-culinary standpoint, a good many 
pertinent questions are asked, until we come to 
“THE PROBLEM OF BEAUTY. 
“ The blossom of May flowers, . . . what does it mean? Why, to 
be more exact, all this beauty? It is always worth living another year to 
see once more, but why? The Orchids, those fleurs de mal, give usa little 
insight into the problem. Their strange and splendid beauty suggests 
advertisement for an insect public. The Orchid is double-sexed, but, as 
Darwin showed, abhors self-fertilisation. His little book on this subject is 
one of the greatest achievements in botany, and may be understanded by 
anyone. Bees, butterflies, flies, and insects, all and sundry, make a living 
out of flower-honey. The structure of the Orchid-bloom is such that the 
pollen-masses stick to the insect’s head or back and are extracted on its 
exit. They cannot fertilise any stigma of the same plant, for they remain 
upright for sufficient time to allow the insect to visit all its flowers. But 
after this interval they contract and bend forward, so that when the insect 
visits the flowers of the next plant they are in a position to fertilise them. 
The time-limit here is beautifully calculated. 
‘ Paramount among paradoxes is the bee-Orchis, growing on English 
chalk-slopes. It was Darwin’s béte noir, for it is self-fertilising in spite of 
its provisions for cross-fertilisation. Many of these Orchids, as everybody 
knows, ape in their appearance the form and colour of butterflies, bees, 
and other insects. The explanation, as far as it goes, is that this mimicry 
attracts other insects, who wonder what food is being sampled by their 
Kindred. There is one Orchid whose tiny flowers flicker like a bunch of 
flies at the sound of your voice. The Cirrhopetalum has in the centre of 
its blossom a lip which looks like a fly balancing. A real fly which 
undertakes the adventure alights on it only to be upset into the machinery 
of the flower. The mimic fly is a balance-trap.”’ 
The author then goes on to speak of other floral developments, and 
€xamples of mimicry that do not concern Orchids, which we need not 
follow. And he asks, “Can natural selection—blessed word !—explain ?”’ 
We should put the case the other way about, and enquire whether the facts 
can be explained on any other theory? Nothing succeeds like success, 
and all unconsciously they pass from one development to another, as 
circumstances permit, following the lines of least resistence. The great 
Problem seems to be how they do it. 
Since the above was written a very interesting communication has been 
