42 THE AMERICAN NATURALIST. [Vor. XXXIV. 
rescence, with its freely exposed honey, is well adapted. The 
long-tongued bees are comparatively rare. The smaller bees 
are very efficient pollinators, and the species are both numer- 
ous and common. The absence, as a rule, of other Hymenop- 
tera is noteworthy. Of Diptera the Syrphide and Empididz 
are the most important. The latter are most abundant in May, 
the time of blooming of several species of Viburnum. Many 
minute flies also seek the flowers. Beetles are very frequent 
visitors to all the species except V. prunifolium, to which none 
are recorded. This is certainly remarkable, and further obser-. 
vations are desirable. Delpino included V. opulus among the 
flowers adapted to beetles, but Müller regarded flies as the 
most efficient pollinators. The variety of Coleoptera is interest- 
ing, as the twenty-six visits I have enumerated were made by 
twenty-one species. Lepidoptera are rare, as the long proboscis 
of these insects is not adapted to suck the honey in rotate 
flowers. 
SYMPHORICARPOS JUSS. 
There are a few flowers which are adapted to wasps, and to 
which these insects are very frequent visitors. The most im- 
portant wasp flowers are Epipactis latifolia Swartz, Cotoneaster 
vulgaris Lindl., Scrophularia nodosa L., Symphoricarpos race- 
asus Michx., and Lonicera alpigena L., the last two belonging 
to the Caprifoliacez. The flowers agree in having abundant 
honey secreted in a short corolla, or pouch-like receptacle, 
about the size of a wasp’s head, and usually lurid colors. In 
England Epipactis latifolia is visited by swarms of wasps, 
which effectually fertilize the plants, and although Darwin saw 
hive bees and bumblebees of many kinds constantly flying over 
the plants, he never saw a bee or any dipterous insect visit the 
flowers. He expresses astonishment that the sweet nectar 
should not be attractive to any kind of bee. Miiller’s state- 
ment is very clear. He says: “This plant in the Alps often 
grows on the same rocks to which a wasp (Polistes gallica) 
has attached its stalked, open nests. I have found the flowers 
visited solely by the above-mentioned wasp, whose head just 
1 Darwin, On the Fertilization of Orchids by Insects, p. 102. 
