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Show 304 IJAR WINIANA. a life of remarkable promise, the latter touchingly alludes in the preface to his second volume-sent to Sir James Ed ward Smith an account of his observations upon this subject, made in 1810 and the follow- · ing years. This was read to the Linnrean Society in 1815, and published in the twelfth volume of its ''Transactions." From this forgotten paper (to which attention has lately been recalled) we cu1l the following extracts, premising that the observations mostly relate to a third species, Sarracenia adwnca, alias variolaris, which is said to be the most efficient flycatcher of the kind : "If, in the months of May, June, or July, when the leaves of those plants perform their extraordinary functions in the greatest perfection, some of them be removed to a house and fixed in an erect position, it will soon be perceived that flies are attracted by them. These insects immediately approach the fauces of the leaves, and, leaning over their edges, appear to sip with eagerness something from their internal surfaces. In this position they linger; but at length, allured as it would seem by the pleasure of taste, they enter the tubes. The fly which has thus changed its situation wiq be seen to stand unsteadily; it totters for a few seconds, slips, and falls to the bottom of the tube, where it is either drowned or attempts in vain to ascend against the points of the hairs. The :f!y seldom takes wing in its fall and escapes ...• In a house much infested with flies, this entrapment goes on so rapidly that a tube is filled in a few . hours, and it becomes necessary to add water, the natural quantity being insufficient to drown .the imprisoned insects. The leaves of 8. adunca and rubra [a fourth species] might well be employed as fly-catchers; indeed, I am credibly informed they ar~ in some neighborhoods. · The leaves of the S. jlava [the species to which our foregoing remarks mainly relate], although they are very capacious, and often grow to the height of INSECTIVOROUS PLANTS. 305 three feet or more, are never found to contain so many insects as those of the species above mentioned. " The cause which attracts flies is evidently a sweet viscid ~ubstance resembling honey, secreted by or exuding fr~m the mternal · sur~acde of the tube .... From the margin, where it commences, It oes not ext!3nd lower than one-fourth of an inch "The falling of the insect as soon as it enters the tube i~ wholly attributable to the downward or inverted position of the hairs of the internal surface of the leaf. At the bottom of a tube split open, the hairs are plainly discernible pointing downward; as the eye ranges upward, they gradually become shorter and attenuated, till at or just below the surface covered by the bait they are no longer perceptible to the naked eye nor to the most delicate touch. It is here that the fly cannot take a hold sufficiently strong to support itself, but falls. The inability of insects to crawl up against the points of the hairs I have often tested in the most satisfactory manner." From the last paragraph it may be inferred that Dr·. Macbride did not suspect any inebriating property in the n~ctar, and in a closing note there is a conjecture of an Impalpable loose powder in B~flava, at the place where the fly stands so unsteadily, and from which it is supposed to slide. We incline to take Mr. Grady's view of the case. The complete oblivion into which this paper and the whole subject had fallen is the more remarkable when it is seen that both are briefly but explicitly referred to in Elliott's book, with which botanists are familiar. It is not so wonderful that the far earlier allusion to these facts by the younger Bartram should have been overlooked or disregarded. With the genuine love of Nature and fondness for exploration, William Bartram did not inherit the simplicity of his father, |