American citizen. [volume] (Canton, Miss.) 1864-1890, 1874-09-19

way are rough as jungle of thistles.
The tubes, when in vigorous state.
generally contain water, part of which
is sometimes caught from rain and the
rest is sccreted by the plant.
These tubes are cunning and deadly
traps, beguiling thirsty insects 10 drink
the beverage they present, and booming
them to a certain death when once they
have venturcd over the smooth, down
ward path to the edge of the water, alias
the haunt of destruction. Having slaked
its thirst, the insect tries to retrace its
steps; but the hairs along which it tray
eled with ease in approaching the liquid
now present their thick and serried
points, like so many pixies, to oppose its
progress, and, amazed, bcwlidercd BAT
fled, the lucklesS victim falls back after
an exhaustive series of fruitless efforts
to escape, and is drowned in the Circcan
cup from which it so innocently and
gratefully drank.
Insects of all orders-ants, katydids,
locusts crickets cockroaches flies, moths
and butterflies-are drowned in hosts in
these treacherous pitchers; yet in only a
single instance has the nectar-loving
bee' been found among the mass of dead
and decaying bodies tished out of their
waters by the naturalists who have made
study of the plants and their prey.
Prof. Riley, State Entomologist of Mis-
souri,, relates that on one occasion he
found in a pitcher the remains of a bon
ibus and again the cold corpse of "A
honey-bee.
As the Pitcher plants grow only in wet
places they cannot need the liquid held
in their leaves for the simple uses of
water. The curious circumstance of
their being supplied with an extra APP
pendage for containing the fluid can only
he explained by the hypothesis that the
decomposing bodies of the insects
drowned in it furnish them wish a liquid
manure which is essential to their exist
ence. The fact that the plants do not
thrive when secluded from insects tends
to substantiate the hypothesis, which is
accepted as nearly proven by the bota-
nists of the day.
4 still more curious family of Pitcher
plants than the Sarraceniads of America
Is the Nepe',ttacea of the Indian Archi-
pelago. The Nepenthes are woody
climbers, with leaves tapering into II
tendril which bears ut the end Il pitcher
of varying size and form. They reach
their greatest development in the island
of Borneo. Wallace says in his history
of the Malay Archipelago: Every noun
tain-top abounds with them, running
along the ground or climbing over shrubs
and stunted trees-their elegant pitchers
hanging in every direction. Some of
these are long and slender, resembling in
form the beautiful Philippine lace-sponge
(Euplecteild), which has now become SO
common; others are broad and short.
Their colors are green, variously tinted
and notified with red or purple. The
finest yet known were obtained on the
summit of -balon, in Northwest
Borneo. One of the broad sort (Nepetthes
rajdh) will hold two quarts of water in its
pitcher. Another (Nepeathes Ed,card-
stdntd) has narrow pitcher, twenty
inches long, while the plant itself grows
to the length of twenty feet"
While among the mountains with his
native attendants, Mr.. Wallace one day
grew distressingly thirsty where no water
was at hand. At last he turned to the
Pitcher plants, the liquid in which was
full of drowned insects and otherwise
repulsive. But, on tasting it, he found
it very palatable, and the whole party
gladly quenched their thirst at these nat
ural fountains. The Indians and the
monkeys who dwell in the regions in
habited by the Nepenthes are in the
habit of drinking from the pitchers when
ever, in their trips at distance from
water, they find need of moistening
their parched tongues. DIR. Turner ex-
perimenting with the water contained in
an unopened pitcher, and therefore
wholly secreted by the plant, found that
it emitted, when boiling, an odor like
baked apples, and containing trace of
vegetable matter, and that it yielded
minute crystals of euperoxalate of pot
ash on being slowly evaporated to dry
ness.
The pitchers of some species of Nepen-
thes are furnished with close-titting lids,
which move on participating hinges,
that close in dry weather, as if to pre-
vent the exhalation of the precious con
tents they cover, and open when the at
mosphere is damp, in order to gather in
the watery vapor. But the most curious
of all the Pitcher plants now known is the
Discltidia Rdffesiana, which grows in the
forests of India. Its long, twining stem
is destitute of leaves until near the eX-
tremity, which may be 100 feet or more
from the roots. Among these leaves are
suspended pitchers with open mouths,
adapted to receive whatever moisture
may descend from the atmosphere in the
form of rain or dew. They are always
found to contain a quantity of water, in
which insects, especially ants, are in all
stages of decomposition. And, strangest
part of the apparatus, on the stem, near
the pitchers, or even on their stalks, grow
tufts of aerial roots which reach over
into the pitchers and absorb the liquid
stored there unquestiOnably for the sus-
tcnance of the plant.-Chicdgo Tribune.