104 



HA RD WICKE' S SCIENCE- G OSS IP. 



lower lip the funniest little apparatus comes into 

 view, and we find that this fold is the leaf-like expan- 

 sion of the stigma. The two stamens are placed in 

 front of the ovary, as shown in the drawing, the anthers 

 being tucked under the curling leaf of the stigma, the 

 upper part of which has a sort of upright tail, which 

 is its second lobe. If a somewhat older flower be 

 examined, the stamens will be found in exactly the 

 same position, but the anthers having burst trans- 

 versely, the pollen will be seen exuding from beneath 

 the enfolding lobe of the stigma, ready to be trans- 

 ferred to the sticky portion of the same stigma, or a 

 different one should some insect visitor arrive betimes. 

 On removing the stamens with a needle, the ovary is 

 seen, dotted over, like the rest of the plant, with 



Fig. 56.— Butterwort [Pinguicula vulgaris). 



shining glands on its pale green surface, and a very 

 pretty object it is with the delicate purple stigma 

 curling over its summit and the little tail cocked up 

 pertly behind. So much for the structure of the 

 flower ; and now a few words as to the measures 

 adopted by the plant for ensuring the efficacy of those 

 possible or probable insect visits just alluded to. 



There is a tribe of hard dry-leaved plants called 

 Bromeliacea;, natives of the continent and islands of 

 America, and capable of enduring great drought 

 without inconvenience, of which the pine-apple is a 

 familiar example. Professor Kerner says that the 

 structure of the butterworts reminds him of this tribe, 

 in which a rosette of leaves forms a basin, and out of 

 its middle rises a slender flower-stem. The basin 

 gets filled with rain or dew, and the flower-stalk 



being thus isolated, creeping insects are prevented 

 from climbing up the stem and getting at the honey 

 which the plant reserves for those only that are useful 

 to it. In the butterwort, this rosette-like basin (or 

 what answers the same purpose) is covered with a 

 tenacious, viscid slime, which is secreted by the thickly 

 crowded glandular hairs. This secretion is so tena- 

 cious that no small insect can get free from it, and 

 the writer [has often counted ten or a dozen lying 

 dead upon a single leaf, some of their bodies being 

 transparent, as if the juices had been sucked out. 

 The larger insects can, of course, free themselves, but 

 they always make for the outer edge of the leaf, and 

 avoid climbing up the flower-stalk. It is generally 

 allowed that the butterworts are able to subsist with- 

 out absorbing the juices of insects after the manner of 

 the sundews, but we may well believe that the sticky 

 rosette of leaves and the glandular scape effectually 

 prevent small insects from creeping up after the honey, 

 while the broad lower lip of the corolla affords a 



■\. 





n s 



fig- S7> — *» Calyx, with stamens seen in front of ovary, leaf- 

 hke stigma overarching them; 2. pistil ; 3, longitudinal sec- 

 tion of same ; 4, 4, stamens in different states ; 5, glandular 

 hairs of leaves ; 6, club-shaped jointed hairs of corolla. All 

 much magnified. 



convenient landing-place for those welcome guests 

 who come to it on the wing, and do not try to enter 

 by the back door ! 



In early June the writer had the pleasure of finding 

 the pale butterwort (Pingziicula lusitanica) in the New 

 Forest. It is a plant that is confined to our extreme 

 southern and south-western counties, having a range 

 from Hants to Cornwall, where it seems to occupy 

 the position of its sister-plant in the more northerly 

 parts of the kingdom, P. vulgaris being rare in the 

 south. The pale butterwort is an altogether smaller 

 and more dainty little plant than the latter ; its rosette 

 of leaves is yellower, and its pale lilac flowers are 

 variously streaked and stained with deep purple and 

 orange markings. The corolla has not the peculiar 

 flattened appearance of the common butterwort, nor 

 is the spur so pointed. The roots, as is commonly 

 the case among bog-plants, are small, and are chiefly 

 useful for anchorage, as the leaves, being so closely 



