16 TRANSACTIONS LIVERPOOL BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



perhaps next lighting on a primrose of the other variety, 

 where the stigma of the pistil is longest, it receives the 

 pollen from the tip of the bee's proboscis. If, on the 

 contrary, a bee visits first the variety with the long 

 stamens and short pistil, its head will probably receive a 

 coating of pollen dust, which will be next imparted to a 

 flower with a long pistil and short, stamens, and so on. 

 The result of this, as of other varieties of cross-fertiliza- 

 tion, is to bring about a tendency to variation and change, 

 and, in conformity with Nature's laws, to favour the 

 evolution of new forms of species by the modification of 

 the old. 



"Natural selection," saj T s Darwin, "acts only by the 

 preservation and accumulation of small inherited modifi- 

 cations, each profitable to the preserved being ; and as 

 modern geology has almost banished such views as the 

 excavation of a great valley by a single diluvial wave, so 

 will natural selection banish the belief of the continued 

 creation of new organic beings, or of any great and sudden 

 modification." 



The very important part played by insects in the fertili- 

 zation of plants is now known to be even far greater than 

 was then supposed, and following on analogous lines, the 

 present year has witnessed a most interesting series 

 of investigations by Dr. Amadeo Berlese, an Italian 

 naturalist, as to the manner in which some insects, flies 

 and ants especially, aid in the multiplication and spread 

 of alcoholic ferments. He has shown that insects, far 

 more than atmospheric air, contribute to the dissemina- 

 tion of yeasts, and considers it probable that during the 

 cold season some yeasts are chiefly preserved inside the 

 bodies of insects. 



The circumstances favourable for the production of new 

 forms, through " natural selection," are treated of at 



