Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 8.djvu/69

Rh Sarracenia variolaris has, however, had its powers carefully investigated by Dr. Mellichamp, of Bluffton, South Carolina. This species differs from the common Northern one (S. purpurea) chiefly in having a lid which closes over the mouth of the trumpet-shaped leaves, so that rain can not readily enter. The leaves are usually half-filled with a fluid which Dr. Mellichamp is satisfied is secreted at the bottom of the tubes. He describes it as mucilaginous, and leaving in the mouth a peculiar astringency. In it meat decomposes more rapidly than in water, and he concludes that as the leaves when stuffed with insects become most disgusting in odor, we have to do with an accelerated decomposition, though not with digestion. He attributes anæsthetic effects to the fluid. The lure which brings the insects to the mouth of the pitcher is a honey-baited pathway running from the ground along the broad wing of the pitcher to its mouth, up which the insects are lured to their fate. Nothing of this kind is observed in S. purpurea, and its exposed mouth is so placed that rain must fall into it. It is not probable, as Dr. Hooker says, that pitchers presenting such differences should act similarly, and he adds: "The fact that insects normally decompose in the fluid of all would suggest the probability that all feed on the products of decomposition; but as yet we are ignorant whether the glands within the pitchers are secretive or absorptive, or both; if secretive, whether they secrete water or a solvent; if absorptive, whether they absorb animal matter or the products of decomposition."

Prof. C. V. Riley (American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1874) is of opinion that the only benefit to the plant is from the liquid manure.

But this fascinating subject cannot be pursued further.

Sentimental flower-worshipers, fond of quoting the pretty metaphor of their buds and blossoms being "truly the language of angels," will doubtless be pained to learn that they are not all ethereal creatures subsisting on such lovely foods as dew and sunlight, but that they are at times given to dining off the more substantial fricassees which their alert tentacles know so well how to prepare. And although they may consign the sanguinary Droseras and Dionœas to the limbo of the unclean, and turn with renewed admiration to their own floral pets, still the matter does not end here. Mr. Darwin throws out some dark hints as to the private lives of the immaculate Primula, the brilliant Pelargonium and other greenhouse favorites, that must lead the thoughtful mind to conclude that that they will at least bear watching.

Seriously, these revelations afford abundant food for thought. There are three remarkable powers connected with the phenomenon: the movement of the leaves when excited; the secreting of a digestive fluid; the absorption of digested matter. The species possessing them all hold them in different degree; some possess two and others but one of them. What light can natural selection throw upon the