58 THE BEE AS AN INSECT. [Ch. i. 



of Arts; and the lecture has since been published as 

 a paper in the Fortnightly Review of April 1877. In 

 the course of his remarks Sir John cited many in- 

 teresting particulars of the ways in which flowers are 

 protected from the incursions of ants, whose visits would 

 be harmful, both from their rifling the stores from the 

 bees, by whom alone they are likely to be fertilised, and 

 from the liability of the latter to desert any species in 

 which their tender probosces were in danger of being 

 seized by ants — it being the nature of an ant to grapple 

 any pointed thing directed towards her. Kemer was re- 

 ferred to as having observed some of the modes by which 

 such results are obviated. In some cases there are chevaux 

 de frise around the flower, in the form of hairs pointing 

 downwards, or other barriers which the ant cannot pene- 

 trate or surmount : notably in the com bluebottle, which 

 is smooth all over except just beneath the "flower, and' 

 in the' thicket heads of some thistles. In others there 

 are glutinous parts which the ant cannot traverse, as 

 was noticed in the Polygonum amphibium, which, when it 

 grows on land, has sticky glands at the extremities of 

 certain hairs, while when in the water, where it is safe 

 already, it is perfectly smooth. Again, there are pendu- 

 lous flowers, like the snowdrop, which are so slippery on 

 the surface that an ant would immediately slide off, as 

 was humorously illustrated by a sketch prepared with 

 several others by the lecturer's daughter. Facts were 

 also stated showing how the pollen is sometimes pre- 



