220 
Flowers and Insects. 
[April, 
So far, again, the opponents of Evolutionism can allege 
little in obje< 5 tion. They may dislike the inferences to which 
experiment and observation obviously lead, but the faCts 
themselves are scarcely to be gainsaid. 
But we come now to the last step. Putting all the above 
considerations together most naturalists infer that in earlier 
ages plants were self-fertilised as certain of the flower forms 
still are ; that anemophilous plants mark in some cases the 
next steps in advance, or possibly in others a decline from 
the ultimate or entomophilous state ; that the brilliant in- 
floration of the higher plants has been gradually evolved in 
the course of the struggle for existence. The more colour a 
plant displayed the more certainly it would be visited 
by the bee and the butterfly ; the more certain these 
visits the greater is the probability of cross-fertilisation, 
and consequently the chance of the production of viable 
seeds. 
Here, however, as we might expeCt, a variety of 
voices are raised in opposition. Among those who seek to 
controvert the views above expounded on the part played by 
inseCts in the fecundation of flowers, a prominent position 
is taken by a French botanist, M. Ed. Heckel. This gen- 
tleman, who must not be confounded with Prof. Ernest 
Haeckel, of the University of Jena, contends that the 
colours of flowers have not been evolved with any relation 
to the perceptions of inseCts. He calls attention to the 
brightness and purity of colour displayed by the Alpine 
flora — an indisputable faCt. He then goes on to maintain 
that in the elevated mountain regions bordering on glaciers 
and snow-fields, inseCts are either wanting or are at least too 
few to play the part assigned to them by Darwin, Sir J. 
Lubbock, Dr. Fritz Muller, Mr. Grant Allen, and a host of 
well-known observers, English, German, and American. 
On the other hand, M. Ch. Musset, after four years of 
observation in the Alps of Dauphine, confirms the views of 
Darwin and his coadjutors, and refutes M. HeckePs asser- 
tion as to the absence or extreme rarity of inseCts at great 
altitudes. He shows that all the different orders of inseCts 
are fairly represented up to about 7000 feet above the level 
of the sea, — the altitude of course varying with climate and 
exposure, — and that even at greater heights the Lepidoptera, 
Hymenoptera, and Diptera were more numerous than the 
other orders. But the groups mentioned are precisely the 
flower-frequenters, whilst the Neuroptera, Orthoptera, and 
Hemiptera contribute little or nothing to the fecundating 
process, so that their absence or scarcity is from this point 
