290 THE ORCHID REVIEW. [OCTOBER, 1909. 
best known cultivated species are comprised under Ancectochilus and a few 
allied genera—grown chiefly for their handsomely variegated leaves— 
and a few species of Spiranthes and Stenorrhynchus, but a few others are 
occasionally seen. Among British and hardy representatives may be 
mentioned Listera, Spiranthes, Goodyera, and Neottia, the latter containing 
the remarkable saprophytic Neottia Nidus-avis, or Bird’s-nest Orchid. The 
pollen masses are generally sectile, the compound granules being regularly 
packed in rows round a central axis, to which they are attached, forming 
a true caudicle, the latter being further united to the gland of the 
rostellum.. 
Very little is known of the fertilisation of the sronieal members of the 
group, but that of some of the temperate representatives has been studied, 
and in the case of Spiranthes and Listera has been recorded in detail. 
Darwin watched a number of Spiranthes autumnalis at Torquay for about 
half an hour, and saw three humble bees of two kinds visit them. He 
caught one and found two perfect pollinia on its proboscis, and the discs of 
three others, showing that the bee had removed the pollinia from five 
flowers, and had probably left the pollen of three on the stigmas of other 
flowers. Next day he.found another at work.. The bees always alighted on 
the bottom of the spike, and crawling spirally up it, sucked one flower after 
the other, something like a woodpecker in search of insects. As soon as the 
flower opens nectar is found in the sac, and there is only a very narrow 
opening between the lip and the column, through which a fine bristle or 
the proboscis of an insect can be passed, and on being withdrawn brings 
away the pollinia. In a day or.two the column moves away from the lip, 
leaving a-wider passage to the-stigma. Everything is beautifully arranged 
for the purpose in view. The bee, on visiting a spike for the first time, 
would bring away the pollen from the youngest and last-opened flower, and 
then fly away to another spike, alighting on the lowest and oldest flower, 
into which a wide passage has now been formed by the reflection of the 
column, thus allowing the pollinia to come into contact with the stigma. 
If the stigma were in an adhesive condition it would capture the pollen 
attached to the insect, but if already covered with pollen this would not 
happen until the bee reached a flower in the right condition. Finally, 
on reaching the upper flower it would withdraw fresh pollinia before flying 
to the next spike. Thus, as Darwin remarks, the bee ‘‘as she goes her 
rounds, and adds to her store of honey, continually fertilises fresh flowers, 
and propagates the race of our autumnal Spiranthes, which will yield honey 
to. further generations of bees.” The rostellum is endowed with a peculiar — 
kind of irritability, for it is slightly furrowed in a longitudinal line, and if — 
this furrow be touched with a small bristle it splits longitudinally, and a — 
little milky fluid exudes, which serves to attach the pollinia to the insect: 
