Red and Indefinites 



of evolution toward their ideals just as nations and men are. 

 Doubtless, when Jack's mechanism is perfected, his guilt will dis- 

 appear. A little way above the florets the club enlarges abruptly, 

 forming a projecting ledge that effectually closes the avenue of 

 escape for many a guileless victim. A fungus gnat, ienticed per- 

 haps by the striped house of refuge from cold spring winds, and 

 with a prospect of food below, enters and slides down the inside 

 walls or the slippery colored column : in either case descent is 

 very easy ; it is the return that is made so difficult, if not impos- 

 sible, for the tiny visitors. Squeezing past the projecting ledge, 

 the gnat finds himself in a roomy apartment whose floor — the 

 bottom of the pulpit — is dusted over with fine pollen ; that is, if he 

 is among staminate flowers already mature. To get some of 

 that pollen, with which the gnat presently covers himself, trans- 

 ferred to the minute pistillate florets waiting for it in a distant 

 chamber is, of course. Jack's whole aim in enticing visitors within 

 his polished walls ; but what means are provided for their escape ? 

 Their efforts to crawl upward over the slippery surface only land 

 them weak and discouraged where they started. The projecting 

 ledge overhead prevents them from using their wings ; the pas- 

 sage between the ledge and the spathe is far too narrow to permit 

 flight. Now, if a gnat be persevering, he will presently discover 

 a gap in the flap where the spathe folds together in front, and 

 through this tiny opening he makes his escape, only to enter an- 

 other pulpit, like the trusted, but too trusting, messenger he is, 

 and leave some of the vitalizing pollen on the fertile florets await- 

 ing his coming. 



But suppose the fly, small as he is, is too large to work his 

 way out through the flap, or too bewildered or stupid to find 

 the opening, or too exhausted after his futile efforts to get out 

 through the overhead route to persevere, or too weak with hun- 

 ger in case of long detention in a pistillate trap where no pollen 

 is, what then ? Open a dozen of Jack's pulpits, and in several, 

 at least, dead victims will be found — pathetic little corpses sacri- 

 ficed to the imperfection of his executive system. Had the flies 

 entered mature spathes, whose walls had spread outward and 

 away from the polished column, flight through the overhead route 

 might have been possible. However glad we may be to make 

 every due allowance for this sacrifice of the higher life to the 

 lower, as only a temporary imperfection of mechanism incidental 

 to the plant's higher development. Jack's present cruelty shocks 

 us no less. Or, it may be, he will become insectivorous like the 

 pitcher plant in time. He comes from a rascally family, anyhow. 

 (See cuckoo pint, p. 156.) 



In June and July the thick-set club, studded over with bright 

 berries, becomes conspicuous, to attract hungry woodland rovers 

 in the hope that the seeds will be dropped far from the parent 

 plant. The Indians used to boil the berries for food. The fari- 



368 



