nts (613/1. Mrs. Darwin and one of her sons,
both recovering from scarlet fever.) got here yesterday, and are doing
well, and we have a second house for the well ones. I write now in great
haste to beg you to look (though I know how busy you are, but I cannot
think of any other naturalist who would be careful) at any field of
common red clover (if such a field is near you) and watch the hive-bees:
probably (if not too late) you will see some sucking at the mouth of the
little flowers and some few sucking at the base of the flowers, at holes
bitten through the corollas. All that you will see is that the bees put
their heads deep into the [flower] head and rout about. Now, if you see
this, do for Heaven's sake catch me some of each and put in spirits and
keep them separate. I am almost certain that they belong to two castes,
with long and short proboscids. This is so curious a point that it seems
worth making out. I cannot hear of a clover field near here.

LETTER 614. TO JOHN LUBBOCK (Lord Avebury). Cliff Cottage, Bournemouth,
Wednesday, September 3rd [1862].

I beg a million pardons. Abuse me to any degree, but forgive me: it
is all an illusion (but almost excusable) about the bees. (614/1.
H. Muller, "Fertilisation of Flowers," page 186, describes hive-bees
visiting Trifolium pratense for the sake of the pollen. Darwin may
perhaps have supposed that these were the variety of bees whose
proboscis was long enough to reach the nectar. In "Cross and Self
Fertilisation," page 361, Darwin describes hive-bees apparently
searching for a secretion on the calyx. In the same passage in "Cross
and Self Fertilisation" he quotes Muller as stating that hive-bees
obtain nectar from red clover by breaking apart the petals. This seems
to us a misinterpretation of the "Befruchtung der Blumen," page 224.) I
do so hope that you have not wasted any time from my stupid blunder. I
hate myself, I hate clover, and I hate bees.

(FIGURE 10.--DIAGRAM OF CRUCIFEROUS FLOWER.

FIGURE 11.--DISSECTION OF CRUCIFEROUS FLOWER.

Laid flat open, showing by dotted lines the course of spiral vessels
in all the organs; sepals and petals shown on one side alone, with the
stamens on one side above with course of vessels indicated, but not
prolonged. Near side of pistil with one spiral vessel cut away.)

LETTER 615. TO J.D. HOOKER. Cliff Cottage, Bournemouth, September 11th,
1862.

You once told me that Cruciferous flowers were anomalous in alternat