22 
A. E. GIBBS-SEEDS AND EftUITS; 
the eye of an animal and be devoured. Many seeds contained in 
esculent fruits have a hard covering and will pass through the 
stomach of an animal or bird uninjured. It is important and 
almost necessary that the fruits should be eaten to release the seeds. 
Yery many of our wild shrubs have bright-coloured seeds, as, for 
instance, the hawthorn, the holly, and the spindle-tree, and it is a 
general though not invariable rule that gaily-tinted fruits are good 
for food. The yew furnishes an instance. Every part of the yew is 
poisonous except the brightly-coloured seed-cup which is a favourite 
food of birds. These facts furnish examples of the inter-depen¬ 
dence of different divisions of the organic world one upon the other. 
The tree furnishes food for the bird, and the bird in return distri¬ 
butes the seed for the tree. Sir John Lubbock has prepared an 
instructive table showing the kind of fruit borne by thirty-three of 
our common climbing plants, forest trees, and tall shrubs, and it 
illustrates forcibly the wonderful way in which plants are adapted 
to circumstances. Eor instance, out of the thirty-three species 
enumerated no less than eighteen have edible seeds or fruits, three 
have fruits provided with feathery hairs, and all the rest have them 
furnished with wings. The lower shrubs and trees have, in general, 
the edible fruits, while several of the taller forest trees possess 
winged seeds or fruit. Not one of these high plants has hooked 
seeds, for they are above the reach of animals, but in every case the 
form of fruit is the one best suited for distribution. 
Birds are highly effective agents for the transportation of seeds. 
Although so clean in their habits they will often convey seeds on 
their bills and in pellets of earth attached to their feet. Mr. 
Darwin tells us that he had the leg of a red-legged partridge sent 
to him after it had been kept for three years. There was a large 
ball of earth adhering to it weighing 6|oz. This was broken, 
watered, and placed under a bell-glass, when no less than eighty- 
two plants sprang from it. We can see therefore how easily birds 
can convey seeds a long distance by this means. 
Then again insects act as seed-disseminators. Natal farmers tell 
us that the great swarms of locusts which visit them bring seeds of 
injurious plants and introduce them into their grass-land. 
Eish, too, may be regarded as plant disseminators, for some species 
have been known to swallow seeds and subsequently eject them. 
One of the most important agents, however, for the distribution 
of seeds, is water. Tides and currents will convey them from land 
to land. It may be that a floating nut is simply washed from one 
island to another, or perhaps, as is often the case, an entire tree is 
undermined by the waves and floated off to some distant land and 
there stranded. The roots of the fallen monarch of the forest convey 
a great deal of earth, and in some coral islands of the Pacific Ocean 
these stranded trees are eagerly looked for by the natives, who pro¬ 
cure the only stones they can obtain for making tools from their 
roots. These stones are government property and form an important 
source of revenue. It can hardly fail to happen that some of the 
seeds attached to the stones and earth will germinate, and so new 
