The Press., 1897-06-17
THREE CURIOUS PLANTS.
The Cannibal Tree, Grapple Plant and
 Vegetable Python.

The C0nniba1 Tree, Grapple Plant and
 Vegetable Python.
 Three of the most dangerous of vege- tative plants in the world are the oan- nibal tree of Australia, the death or grapple plant of South Africa and the vegetable python of New Zealand.
 The cannibal tree grows up in the shape of huge pineapple and attains a height of Il feet. It has a series of broad, boardlike leaves growing in a fringe at the apex, which forcibly bring to mind @ giganSic Central American agave, and these boardlike leaves, from 10 to 12 feet in the smaller specimens and from l 5 to 90 feet in the larger, hang to the ground and are easily strong enough to bear the weight of 8 man of 40 pounds or more. In the ancient times this tree was worshiped by the native savages under the name of the devil tree, part of the interest ing ceremony being the sacrifice of one of their number to its all too ready em- brace. The victim to be sacrificed was driven up the leaves of the tree to the apex, and the instant the so called pis- tils of the monster were touched the leaves would fly together like trap, crushing the life out of the intruder. In this way the tree would hold it's vicsgm until every particle of flesh would dis appear from his bones.
 The grapple plant is prostrate herb growing in South Africa. Its flowers are purple and shaped like the English foxglove Its fruit has formidable hooks which, by olinging to any passerby, is conveyed to situations where it's seed may find suitable conditions for growth. Sir John Lubbock says it has been known to kill lions.
 The vegetable python, which is known to the naturalist as the clusia or fig, is the strangler of trees The seeds of the clusia, being provided with a pulp and very pleasant to the tropical birds which feed thereon, are carried from tree to tree and deposited on the branches. Here germination begins. The leafy stem slowly rises, while the roots flow, as 1t were, down the trunk until the soil is reached. Here and there they branch, changing their course ac- cording to the direction of any obstruc- tions met with. Meanwhile from these rootlets leafy branches have been de- veloped, which, pushing themselves through the canopy above, get into the light ,lnd enormously accelerate their growth.
 Now a metamorphosis takes place, for the hitherto soft aerial roots begin to harden and spread wider and wider, throwing out side branches, which flow into and amalgamate with each other until the whole tree trunk is bound in a series of irregular living hoops From this time on it is a struggle of life and death between the forest giant and the entwining clusia. Like an athlete the tree tries to expand and burst its fet- ters, causing the bark to bulge between every interlacing, but success and free dom are not for the captive tree, for the monster clusia has made its bands very numerous and wide. Not allowed ex- pansion, the tree soon withers and dies, and the strangler is soon expanded into a great bush, almost as large as the mass of branches and foliage it has effaced. It is truly tragedy in the world of vegetation.-Los Angeles Herald.