94 THE VEGETABLE WORLD. 
are composed of two parts—the one elongated, which may be con- 
sidered as a sort of petiole, the other larger and broader and nearly 
circular, formed like two trap-nets, which are united at the base 
by a nervure, fashioned like a hinge, and furnished round the edge 
with rough hairy cils. In the upper surface these plates are 
‘furnished with certain small glands, whence exudes a viscous 
’ liquid which attracts 
the insects. If a fly 
lights on this singular 
apparatus, the trap 
raises itself quickly by 
means of its long hinge. 
They approach, and it 
closes, rapidly crossing 
its long cilia, and the 
insect is a prisoner. 
The efforts of the fly to 
escape, increases the 
irritability of the plant, 
whose fangs only opet 
when the movements of 
the animal have ceased, 
* sensitiva, Fig. 123, has 
2 not also remarked on 
the strange sensibility 
of its leaves? The 
lightest touch suffices 
to make its folioles close 
upon their supports, the petiolar twigs upon the common petiole, 
the common petiole upon the stem. If we cut with scissors the 
extreme end of one foliole, the others immediately approach ™ 
succession. De Candolle was in the habit of placing a drop of 
water upon one of the folioles of the Sensitive plant, applying it 
with so much delicacy as to excite no: movement whatever. But 
Fig. 122,—Dionza muscipula. 
