Even while he is flying to another flower, that is to say, in
half a minute, the stalks of the pollen masses bend downward from
the perpendicular and slightly toward the center, or just far
enough to require the moth, in thrusting his proboscis into the
nectary, to strike the glutinous, sticky stigma. Now, withdrawing
his head, either or both of the golden clubs he brought in with
him will be left on the precise spot where they will fertilize
the flower. Sometimes, but rarely, we catch a butterfly or moth
from the smaller or larger purple orchids with a pollen mass
attached to his tongue, instead of to his eyes; this is when he
does not make his entrance from the exact center - as in these
flowers he is not obliged to do - and in order to reach the
nectary his tongue necessarily brushes against one of the sticky
anther sacs. The performance may be successfully imitated by
thrusting some blunt point about the size of a moth's head, a
dull pencil or a knitting-needle, into the flower as an insect
would enter. Withdraw the pencil, and one or both of the pollen
masses will be found sticking to it, and already automatically
changing their attitude. In the case of the large, round-leaved
orchis, whose greenish-white flowers are fertilized in a similar
manner by the sphinx moth, the anther sacs converge, like little
horns; and their change of attitude while they are being carried
to fertilize another flower is quite as exquisitely exact.

Usually in wetter ground than we find its more beautiful big
sister growing in, most frequently in swamps and bogs, the
SMALLER PURPLE-FRINGED ORCHIS (H. psycodes) lifts its perfumed
lilac spires. Thither go the butterflies and long-lipped bees to
feast in July and August. Inasmuch as without their aid the