at random for solid bodies round which, when found, they twine their tendrils; these then support the plant, it being unable to stand by itself without help. That is, they do the same thing as the eyeless caterpillar, which when seeking a leaf describes circles in the air with the upper part of its body. Dutrochet contributes a good deal of information too concerning other movements in plants in this treatise: for instance, that _stylidium graminifolium_ in New Holland, has a column in the middle of its _corolla_ which bears the anthers and _stigma_ and alternately folds up and unfolds again. What Treviranus adduces is to the same effect:[253] "In _parnassia palustris_ and in _ruta graveolens_, the stamina incline one after the other, in _saxifraga tridactylites_ in pairs, towards the stigma, and erect themselves again in the same order."--Shortly before however, we read in Treviranus with reference to this subject: "Of all apparently voluntary movements of plants, the direction of their boughs and of the upper surface of their leaves towards the light and towards moist heat, and the twining movements of creepers round their supports, are the most universal. In this last phenomenon especially there is something which resembles animal movements. While growing, creepers, it is true, if left to themselves, describe circles with their tips and by this means reach an object near at hand. But it is no merely mechanical cause that induces them to adapt their growth to the form of the object they have thus reached. The _cuscuta_ does not twine round every kind of support: for instance, limbs of animals, dead vegetable matter, metals and inorganic substances are not used for this purpose, but only living plants, and not even all kinds--not mosses, for instance--only those from which it can extract nourishment by its _papillæ_; and these attract it from a considerable distance."[254] The following special observation, communicated to the "Farmer's Magazine," and reproduced by the "Times" (13th July 1848) under the title "Vegetable Instinct," is however still more to the point: "If a basin of water be placed within six inches of a young pumpkin-stalk, or of a stem of the large garden pea, no matter on what side, the stalk will approach the basin during the night and it will be found next morning with one of its leaves floating on the water. This experiment may be renewed every night till the plant begins to fructify.--Even if its position be changed every day, a stick fixed upright within six inches of a young convolvulus is sure to be found by the plant. If, after having wound itself for a certain distance round the stick, it is unwound and wound round again in the opposite direction, it will return to its original position or lose its life in the endeavour to do so. Nevertheless, if two such plants grow close to one another without having any stick near enough for them to cling to it, one of them will change the direction of its