Trelease.] 
418 
[March 15, 
tracted month and the ovary, which is raised on a stalk of 
considerable length, possibly that it may lie in the proper position 
to aid in limiting the size of the opening. 
Although the narrowness of the entrance, and the length of 
the calyx are not necessarily such as to exclude bees and similar 
insects, the short recurved lobes offer them a very poor alight- 
ing place which is rendered partly inaccessible by the rigid style 
prolonged above it. Moreover, it will be noticed that such insects 
in visiting the flowers need not encounter the greatly exserted 
polliniferous or stigmatic surfaces ; and unless they do this con- 
stantly their visits can be of little value to the plant. The flowers 
appear rather adapted by their color and form to diurnal 
Lepidoptera, which can readily effect their crossing while feeding 
upon the nectar. 
Self-fertilization was not found to occur in this species. The 
flowers of a small jflant were all carefully watched, and all fell 
away without forming fruit, with the exception of a few that were 
artificially fertilized with pollen from other flowers on the same 
plant. In some of these cases fruiting did not result, and it is 
possible that seeds may not have formed in the fruits that were 
produced, though the latter were developing rapidly when 
observed for the last time. In several flowers that were not 
crossed the end of the style was brushed after the stigma was 
mature, so that pollen was brought upon this organ, yet none of 
these produced fruit, but fell away quite as early as those that 
had not been touched. The flowers apjaear from this to be inca- 
pable of the closest fertilization, from physiological reasons, 
though flowers of the same plant are capable of reciprocal fertili- 
zation. Whether self-fertility would be greater in more vig- 
orous plants growing wild I am unable to say. 
In other species the pollen does not effect fertilization if 
allowed to remain upon its own stigma until mature. This not 
only occurs in greenhouses, where fruiting of these plants is not 
vigorous under any circumstances, but it is found to be so univer- 
sal with Banksias, whose styles have been unable to escape from 
the perianth and are thus prevented from receiving foreign pollen 
although smothered in their own, that Mr. Bentham believes 
perfect fruit always to correspond to liberated styles. Beside 
the explanation of self-impotence, one other has been proposed: 
