JACK-IN-THE-PULPIT 49 



heard him telling Philip Todd. Philip said, with 

 one of his queer laughs, " He hasn't much Chris- 

 tian charity." 



After this they talked a long time about the 

 Preacher, and I learned that they both think it 

 punishes little insects that crawl into the pulpit for 

 the sake of sipping the tiny florets' nectar. It is 

 easy enough for them to get down into the pulpit, 

 but when they want to come out they find that its 

 inner sides are too slippery for them to walk over. 

 Then above where the florets cluster around the 

 little piece called Jack, it grows larger, form- 

 ing a ledge, which makes it quite impossible for 

 small insects to get out by using their wings. Just 

 why the Preacher wishes to keep them down in the 

 pulpit until they die neither Tommy nor Philip 

 knew. 



But an old gentleman who comes to see Grand- 

 mother sometimes, and who is a botanist, has told 

 us since then that it is because the plant really 

 wants them for nourishment. It uses them after 

 they are quite dead, as we do food. 



At the Botanical Garden at Bronx Park, I 

 saw a plant which did this very same thing, 

 only in a different way. It was called Venus's 

 Fly-trap, and its leaves were exactly like little 

 traps with hinges in the middle. All around their 

 edges were sharp bristles. I saw these leaves 

 catching the flies that visitors to the garden fed 

 them; and the people said the plant was known 



