Page:Wisdom of the Wilderness (1923).pdf/192

 upon a strange plant, quite unlike any she had ever seen before. There was no main stalk; but a cluster of stout stems, arising from the crown of the root, bore each one leaf, some three or four inches in length, shaped like a broad-lipped water jug. The leaves were of a lucent, tender green, veined and striped with vivid crimson, and gave forth a subtle odor, perceptible to none but the most delicate senses, which seemed to suggest honeydew. What reasonable ant could resist the lure of honeydew? Formica could not.

But if she had known that this was the terrible carnivorous pitcher plant, the relentless devourer of insects, she would have fled in horror.

Instead of fleeing, however, she eagerly ran up the nearest stem, and up the cool, translucent, redveined globe of the lower leaf, delighted to find that the firm hairs which covered stem and leaf alike all pointed upwards instead of downwards, and so offered no obstacle to her progress. Gaining the rim of the pitcher, she peered inside, looking for the source of that honeydew fragrance. Beneath her she saw a fairylike interior, filled with cool green light, and about half full of water. In the water, to be sure, there floated the drowned bodies of a wasp, a spider, and several small flies. But this fact conveyed no warning to