Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Drosera singultantem


Should a JADE DWARF MONITOR
(ibid.) make the not-uncommon error of nibbling on a poisonous TRICK HELMET MOREL (ibid.), mistaking it for a harmless and succulent GALAHAD’S MOREL (ibid.), it will at first feel deprived of oxygen and gasp ineffectually — then, as though struck by lightning, it will suffer the second blow: an all-encompassing paralysis, which without fail will leave it with motionless jaws wide-open. The soft flesh of the inside of a moribund Jade Dwarf Monitor’s mouth is the favorite repast of the CARRION SYLPH CHAFER (ibid.), an insect that might easily, in another circumstance, become a healthy Monitor’s supper.

But in its haste to conquer the much larger adversary, a Carrion Sylph Chafer risks a similar blunder. For among the morels grows the THROATWHEEL GARNET (Drosera singultantem animam), which boasts a rosette of bright leaves (often confused with its blossom) that simulates the fixed yawn of a dying Dwarf Monitor, right down to the sickly magenta hue that the reptile’s mouth will assume once poisoned. A Sylph Chafer that pounces hungrily on this rosette will find itself snared by mucus-laced fibers, smothered by closing leaves — and soundly digested.

From: P. Hambunck Constanelle, Constanelle’s Global Flora, 4rd Ed. Mandaroeb & Sons, 1873: p. 517.