Sallie L. Andrew

“ When an insect alights upon a leaf (I say leaf, although the hairs upon the stems, calyxes, and even the outer and lower portions of the flower-tubes are quite as vigorous, and as often successful) , it at first manifests much alarm, runs with as much strength as possible up and down and under the leaf, lifting its feet with more and more of an effort, until at last, either benumbed or exhausted, its motions are almost imperceptible, and sometimes for an hour will occur at such long intervals that one decides half a dozen times that death must already have taken place. ”

“ Small seeds and bits of sand are sometimes caught in the same manner, but rather daintily, as if the plant merely wished to see if it were worth while or not (as in Fig. 9) . I have never seen them inclosed by the hairs, as are the animal substances. These are some of the things that I have seen. I do not know what may be the motive of the plant; what it does with the insect, the last stage of whose strange eventful history I have so often seen in a dry, withered carcass, or a few detached and macerated limbs (Fig. 10) . ”

“ On one occasion, a branch bearing a lively little insect was cut from the plant, put into water, and the leaf on which the insect was struggling placed under the microscope about six o'clock in the evening, and watched until eleven, by which time life was undoubtedly extinct. ”