BY A. G. HAMILTON. 
365 
theory that the parts of an organism that have undergone the 
most modification also show the greatest depth of colouring. The 
flower-stalks and undersides of the leaves are densely covered 
with stellate hairs; the upper-sides of the leaves are less thickly 
covered, and the edges are armed with short thick conical hairs. 
The calyx and lobes of corolla (but not the membranous wings) 
are covered with dark olive-green branching hairs, resembling 
those of I), luteiflora (Fig. 14). 
Referring to this genus, Mr. Bentham says [3] : " In Dampiera 
the summit of the style, when short in the buds, has the appear- 
ance of an ordinary peltate stigma, except that it is not yet 
papillose, flat and nearly circular, with the rudiment of the stigma 
across the centre. It soon rises, the margins are raised into a 
short almost two-lipped indusium; but I do not find that it carries 
any pollen with it, and the stigma does not assume the perfect 
appearance till the whole indusium and the stigma has ensconced 
itself between the two upper petals, which closely embrace it by 
means of two thickened concave appendages, requiring some 
external agency to open them and give access to the pollen." 
This is a perfectly accurate description of the mechanism of the 
flower, except that the pollen is carried by the up-growing style. 
Indeed, in reading the paper I was struck with the correctness of 
the descriptions of the process in all the genera; and it is all the 
more remarkable when it is remembered that the author had 
only dried plants to deal with. 
After finishing the above account of D. Brownii, I observed a 
fact which I had previously missed, but which is of great import- 
ance. A very large proportion of the flowers of this species are 
resupinate, so that the auricles are on the lower side and the three 
other petals on the upper side of the flower. When a flower is 
in this position it is manifestly impossible for the pollen accumu- 
lated in the auricles to drop out on the insect. But on the other 
hand, an insect visiting such a flower would be smeared on the 
underside by the projecting stream of pollen coming out of the 
indusium, and in visiting another flower in which all the pollen 
had been exuded the pollen from other flowers would be left on 
