Sense-Life and Sensibility 
they will turn away from poisonous substances. Not 
only so, but they are attracted by small quantities of 
certain salts, and are repulsed and grow away from 
large amounts of the same substances. When in excess 
even nutritive solutions are or might be poisonous.” 
But strange as are these fitting reactions of vegetable 
protoplasm, those exhibited by such plants as the 
sundew, pitcher-plant, and the like are infinitely more 
remarkable. 
It is unnecessary to describe how the tentacles of the 
sundew turn and pin down the unfortunate insect which 
has alighted upon it, for this has often been done. But 
one should mention here that small grains of sand, bits 
of wood, paper, or glass particles produce no secretion 
of the glands. Small pieces of meat, egg-albumin, &c., 
on the other hand, are soon surrounded with secretion, 
and will be absorbed in some fifteen minutes. The liquid 
in a Nepenthes pitcher is of great importance, for a fly 
laid in a pitcher that has been emptied of its water is 
very slightly affected even after four hours. But if you 
dip the insect in the fluid of another pitcher and then 
lay it in the dry one, there is an abundant flow of 
secretion, and nothing will be left of the fly except 
insoluble chitin in six to eight hours’ time,!® 
These facts are surely very remarkable. The reader 
must be left to draw his own conclusions as to whether 
it is fair to say that plants are senseless automata, mere 
complex mechanisms unable to enjoy the sunshine and 
the sweetness of life. 
They are certainly for the most part not guilty of 
senseless and useless cruelty, except perhaps certain 
Asclepiads, and notably Araujia sericifera, which grows 
at Buenos Ayres. 
This evil plant has a sweet vanilla perfume which 
attracts numbers of butterflies. But when they attempt 
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