236 THE ORCHID REVIEW. 
in the flowers all day long. These bees, Mr. Quelch kindly informs me, 
belong to the genus Euglossa, a genus allied to Bombus, which comprises 
only the common humble bees, and the members of the two genera ate 
about the same size—that is, from three-quarters to oneand a quarter inches 
long. The members of Euglossa are distinguished by the long proboscis 
they possess, which exceeds the length of the body, when stretched its fill 
length. When not employed it is kept folded near the mouth. The smaller 
species of the two I captured had two bars of yellow or gold on the base of 
the body, and the larger three. In most of the Catasetums the female 
flowers are inverted, the lip, which is in the shape of a hood, being above 
the other parts, with the column, to which it is attached, underneath it 
Each of these two species of Euglossa which visited the flowers adopted @ 
different course in entering the cavity of the lip in their search for nectar. 
The smaller spécies alighted invariably on the column, and walked downits 
face into the lip, and took up the nectar, retreating, when finished, by 
walking backward on the face of the column again. While inside the flower 
however, it kept on, without cessation, brushing by repeated contraction 
the top of the column with the end of its body. By this process, ifa = 
flower were approached and treated in the same way these female foes 
were treated, the pollinia would be detached and would adhere to the bees 
body, and when the female flower in turn was visited it would be fe 
by the stigma, which is near the end of the column, being brushed by tt 
column, by the contractions of body I have described. ite 
The larger species, however, invariably adopted a different course a 
alighted on the summit of the lip, and walked in back downey 
house-fly walks on a ceiling, and in doing so its back invariably touched i 
top of the column. Entering a flower in this way the pollinia would P 
liberated by the pressure, and would stick to the back of the inset 
when a female flower was entered it would rub against the stigmatic pe 
thus effecting fertilisation of the flower. These deductions I derived ‘ 
watching the bees at the flowers, and subsequently the accuracy on 
second one was confirmed by my seeing a bee at work extracting the n° 
from the flowers, with the pollinia from a male flower firmly attach’, 
the sticky disc to its back between the shoulders. Where it got te and 
from I do not know, as when I first saw it the pair were attached toit 
very conspicuous. I captured it with the pollinia on, and it 1S 1 : 
British Guiana Museum. I have since seen another of the same — 
bee flying about with a pair of pollinia attached between its © oe 
exactly in the same manner.—G. S. Jenman in Demerara Are) ae 
8th, 1889. 
