Dec. 7, igia 
FOREST AND STREAM 
711 
CRIME OF A CREEPER. 
A highly original plot for a detective story 
was suggested by the Rev. Prof. G. Henslow, 
who lectured on the “Senses of Plants” before 
members of the Royal Horticultural Society re¬ 
cently. 
“A distinguished gardener,” said the pro¬ 
fessor, “was dozing in a chair in his drawing 
room one sultry summer afternoon, and a bottle 
stood on the table by his side. Suddenly the 
bottle began to move stealthily across the table. 
The sleeper woke up; the bottle had disap¬ 
peared. In astonishment, which might have 
been agitated had the bottle contained anything 
but a bunch of blossoms, he set out to investi¬ 
gate. 
“In the midst of his meditations the thief 
fortunately gave audible warning of his prox¬ 
imity. Glancing out of his window the horti¬ 
culturist saw an astonishing sight. The tinkle, 
tinkle he had heard was a Virginia creeper rat¬ 
tling the bottle against the window pane!” 
The lecturer pointed out that little parlor 
tricks of this sort were quite a favorite pas¬ 
time with the creeper. “The adhesive pads on 
its tendrils are irritated by anything it touches 
and stick to it like a leech. Really it may be 
quite feasible to train a plant to pick pockets. 
“The fashionable sweet pea if touched on 
one of its tendrils with a stick or rubbed gently 
for half an hour will begin to twist round the 
stick. If teased further it will grapple with its 
tormentor. Besides the twisting motion it has 
another which has been described as ‘bow 
around,’ or circum-mutation. This is an en¬ 
deavor to fasten on something. ‘It was^ un¬ 
doubtedly its success in “bowing around” or 
circum-mutation, my dear Watson, that enabled 
the creeper to carry off the bottle.’ 
“Though we have yet to find plants that 
can hear or smell, many of our common 
growths are sensitive to touch, taste, sight and 
thirst. Chlorophyll, which is the green color¬ 
ing matter of leaves, not only stores up the 
energy of the sun in plants, but enables the 
plant to select the light ray that is most bene¬ 
ficial to it. In millions of little green granules 
under the epidermis of the leaf, it is in fact 
the eyes of the plant. It can detect every color 
and rays the human eye cannot see. 
“The projected giant sun concentrator 
which may make the Sudan the power house of 
the world was long ago anticipated by nature 
in the schizostigma. This apparently terrible 
creature is nothing more formidable than a type 
of moss. Nature has endowed it with lenses 
in the form of globular granules which concen¬ 
trate and condense light and so feed the plant 
in the shade. Too much light, however, turns 
leaves yellow, and plants can be made to turn 
their coats by the action of light upon them. 
“Plants in fact are just as sensitive as we are. 
Insectivorous plants can undoubtedly taste 
what is given them and refuse it as certainly as 
the gourmet would an inferior dish at the 
dinner of a city company. They only like nitro¬ 
genous substances; sugar, starch, oil, and such 
fattening carbohydrates they have no use for. 
“The craving of plants and trees for water 
has sometimes led them to terrible extremes. 
A poplar has been known to burrow beneath 
a wall, under a road, and down a well—all in 
search of water, and a pertinacious turnip which 
got the tip of its root into the crack in a field 
drain went on and on until it was six feet long 
in the drain. So sensitive is the tip of the root 
on the water question that Darwin declared it 
must have a brain in it. 
• “If ever a book is written on ‘vegetable 
mechanics’ one will find that plants have made 
levers, screws, columns, wedges—everything in 
fact that engineers do.”—London Standard. 
DIFFERENT KIND OF DOG. 
Griggs—Lost money in that stock deal, did 
you? Say, let me give you a pointer. 
Briggs — No you don’t! No more pointers 
for me. What I’m looking for now is a re¬ 
triever. — Boston Transcript. 
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American Woolen Bldg., 4th Ave., 18th to igth Sts. 
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THE ANGLER’S NEWS? 
If you are an angler, please send for 
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A. R. Mat«bews,“The Angler’s News” 
15 Gough Square, Loudon, E. C. 
Contains articles, illustrations, and news 
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