12' # KEW GARDENS. 



and, mark ! — eacli leaflet folds itself close to the midrib, like the 

 sticks of a shut fan, and the^ootstalk itself of the leaf has a joint 

 at the axilla, by which it drops and stands at ease. This is the 

 Humble Plant, Mimosa pudica^^ very different from the Sensitive 

 Plant, M. sensitiva, which you will see in the great Palm Stove. 

 Though both are so curious, and one so pretty here at home, in 

 Brazil and the West Indies they are nuisances to be exterminated 

 by fire. Their prickly stems choke the growth of sweeter herbage; 

 —neither is it clear that the cattle like to have their noses tickled 

 by the motions of living plants that writhe when they begin to be 

 eaten. And now a small bell-glass is lifted ; the scissors touch a 

 pair of scaly leaves fringed Avith green bristles ; they close : it is 

 the American Fly-trap (Dioncea muscipula)^ which has, as its 

 name implies, a veritable living trap at the end of its leaves. Lis- 

 ten to what is said: — • 



' The moment an insect (or any extraneous body) touches the 

 hairs on the disc, the tv/o lobes close firmly and press the luckless 

 intruder to death ; the struggles of the victim indeed, occasioning 

 the lobes to shut more firmly, hastening its own destruction. As 

 soon as the insect ceases to struggle, and dies, the trap opens, 

 ready to continue the work of destruc ion ; but there is no reason 

 whatever to suppose that the dead insects in any way nourish the 

 plant.' 



What, then, can be the object of the contrivance, unless the 

 checking a superabundance of insect life ? The facts are not nov- 

 el, but are too wonderful ever to become stale. Gigantic plants 

 existed in prse-adamite times. If there v/ere then a Fly-trap large 

 enough to catch a man ! You have rightly guessed that our con- 

 ductor, so full of information and so kind in imparting it, is Sir W. 

 H. himself. He crushes an evergreen leaf, and gives it to a friend 

 to enjoy the perfume, perceptibly that of the clove ; to another he 

 offers a bruised morsel of the lemon-grass, having a delicate odour 

 like the three-leaved Verbena. Tea from this fragrant herb was 

 a favourite beverage with the good Queen Charlotte ; and the ru- 

 mour is, that it is not unpalatable to the most illustrious of her 

 Majesty's descendants. Observe the Caricature Plant, with bright 

 green leaves something like those of the Bay-tree, but marked 

 down the middle with yellow blotches, the outline of many of 

 which bears a very accurate resemblance to the human face, more 

 or less divine. Here is the Duke, and here Lord Brougham, dos 



