XXVII] 



DR. SPRUCE 



67 



flower, but the little tree on which it grew — a Phyllanthus, 

 with slightly milky and quite innocuous juice, had been taken 

 possession of by a horde of ants, and I had to wait until they 

 had stripped it of every leaf before I could pull down my 

 Securidaca, which they had left quite untouched. It was 

 probably preserved by its drastic properties from sharing the 

 fate of the Phyllanthus.] 



"Many odoriferous leaves seem destitute of special oil- 

 glands, and their essential oil probably exists in nearly 

 every cell, along with the chlorophyll as I have found it in 

 several aromatic Hepatics. Many Laurineae and Burseraceae 

 (Amyrideae of Lindley) are in this case. The latter are 

 eminently resiniferous, and yield the best native pitch (the 

 brea hranca) of the Amazon valley. I have never seen their 

 leaves mutilated by ants, and I think never by catterpillars. 

 Oil-glands indeed exist in many plants where they are either 

 so deeply imbedded or so minute as only to be detected by 

 close scrutiny. Their presence was denied in the Nutmegs 

 (see Lindley, etc.)^ until I found them in the American 

 species, and one species has them so conspicuous that I have 

 called it Myristica punctata. 



" In nearly all these plants, however, when the essential 

 oil has been wholly or in part dissipated by drying, the 

 leaf-cutters find the leaves apt material for their purpose — 

 whatever that may be.^ They once fell on some of my dried 

 specimens, and first cut up a Croton — a genus I had never 

 seen them touch in the living state. It reminded me of our 

 cows in England, which cautiously avoid the fresh foliage of 

 Buttercups, but eat it readily when made into hay. The 

 acrid principle in these and many other plants, odorous and 

 inodorous, is known to be highly volatile. 



" Where aromatic plants most abound is in the dry — often 

 nearly treeless — mountainous parts of southern Europe and 

 Western Asia, especially in the sierras of Spain. When I 



^ In Lindley's " Vegetable Kingdom " (3rd ed.) he gives among the characters 

 of the Order Myristicaceae, " Leaves not dotted." — A. R. W. 



^ The ants store these leaves in extensive underground cavities, where fungi 

 grow on them on which the ants feed (see Bates and Belt).— A. R. W. 



