2 DROSERA ROTUNDIFOLIA. Cuap. I. 
gathered by chance a dozen plants, bearing fifty-six 
fully expanded leaves, and on thirty-one of these dead 
insects or remnants of them adhered; and, no doubt, 
many more would have been caught afterwards by these 
same leaves, and still more by those as yet not ex- 
panded. On one plant all six leaves had caught their 
prey; and on several plants very many leaves had 
caught more than a single insect. On one large leaf 
I found the remains of thirteen distinct insects. 
Flies (Diptera) are captured much oftener than other 
msects. The largest kind which I have seen caught 
was a small butterfly (Cenonympha pamphilus); but 
the Rev. H. M. Wilkinson informs me that he found a 
large living dragon-fly with its body firmly held by 
two leaves. As this plant is extremely common in 
some districts, the number of insects thus annually 
slaughtered must be prodigious. Many plants cause 
the death of insects, for instance the sticky buds of 
the horse-chestnut (isculus hippocastanum), without 
thereby receiving, as far as we can perceive, any ad- 
vantage; but it was soon evident that Drosera was 
which was published in the Gar- 
dener’s Chronicle, 1863, p. 30. 
Mr. Scott shows that gentle irrita- 
tion of the hairs, as well as insects 
placed on the dise of the leaf, 
cause the hairs to bend in- 
wards. Mr. A. W. Bennett also 
gave another interesting account 
of the movements of the leaves 
before the British Association for 
1873. In this same year Dr. 
Warming published an essay, in 
which he describes the structure 
of the so-called hairs, entitled, 
“Sur la Différence entre les Tri- 
chomes,” &c., extracted from the 
proceedings of the Soc. d’Hist. 
Nat. de Copenhague. I shall also 
have occasion hereafter to refcr 
to a paper by Mrs. Treat, of New 
Jersey, on some American species 
of Drosera. Dr. Burdon Sander- 
son delivered a lecture on Dionza, 
before the Royal Institution (pub- 
lished in ‘ Nature,’ June 14, 1874), 
in which a short account of my 
observations on the power of true 
digestion possessed by Drosera 
and Dionza first appeared. Prof. 
Asa Gray has done good service 
by calling attention to Drosera, 
and to other plants having similar 
habits, in ‘The Nation’ (1874, pp. 
261 and 232), and in otber publica- 
tions. Dr. Hooker, also, in his 
important address on Carnivorous 
Plants (Brit. Assoc., Belfast, 1874), 
has given a history of the subject, 
