Professor Jonkins Cannibal Plant | Page 3

friend
sent you from Brazil?"
"The same."
"ButÑbutÑ"
"But how it's grown, that's what you want to say, isn't it?"
"It is. How did you do it?"
"By dieting the blossoms."
"You meanÑ?"
"I mean feeding them. Listen. I reasoned that if a small blossom of the
plant would thrive on a few insects, by giving it larger meals I might
get a bigger plant. So I made my plans.
"First I cut off all but one blossom, so that the strength of the plant
would nourish that alone. Then I made out a bill of fare. I began
feeding it on chopped beef. The plant took to it like a puppy. It seemed
to beg for more. From chopped meat I went to small pieces, cut up. I
could fairly see the blossom increase in size. From that I went to choice
mutton chops, and, after a week of them, with the plant becoming more
gigantic all the while, I increased its meals to a porterhouse steak a day.
And nowÑ"
The professor paused to contemplate his botanical work.
"Well, now?" questioned Adams.
"Now," went on the professor proudly, "my pitcher plant takes three
big beefsteaks every dayÑone for breakfast, one for dinner, and one for

supper. And see the result."
Adams gazed at the immense plant. From a growth about as big as an
Easter lily it had increased until the top was near the roof of the
greenhouse, twenty-five feet above. About fifteen feet up, or ten feet
from the top, there branched out a great flower, about eight feet long
and three feet across the bell-shaped mouth, which except for the cap or
cover, was not unlike the opening of an immense morning glory. The
flower was heavy, and the stalk on which it grew was not strong
enough to support it upright. So a rude scaffolding had been
constructed of wood and boards, and on a frame the flower was held
upright.
In order to see it to better advantage, and also that he might feed it, the
professor had a ladder by which he could ascend to a small platform in
front of the bell-shaped mouth of the blossom.
"It is time to give my pet its meal," he announced, as if he were
speaking of some favorite horse. "Want to come up and watch it eat?"
"No, thank you," responded Adams. "It's too uncanny." The professor
took a large steak, one of the three which the butcher boy had left that
day. Holding it in his hand, he climbed up the ladder and was soon on
the platform in front of the plant.
Adams watched him curiously. The professor leaned over to toss the
steak into the yawning mouth of the flower.
Suddenly Adams saw him totter, throw his arms wildly in the air, and
then, as if drawn by some overpowering force, he fell forward, lost his
balance, and toppled into the maw of the pitcher plant!
There was a jar to the stalk and blossom as the professor fell within. He
went head first into the tube, or eating apparatus of the strange plant,
his legs sticking out for an instant, kicking wildly. Then he disappeared
entirely.
Adams didn't know whether to laugh or be alarmed. He mounted the

ladder, and stood in amazement before the result of the professor's
work as he looked down into the depth of the gigantic flower, increased
a hundred times in size.
He was aware of a strange, sickish-sweet odor that seemed to steal over
his senses. It was lulling him to sleep, and he fought against it. Then he
looked down and saw that the huge hairs or filaments with which the
tube was lined were in violent motion.
He could just discern the professor's feet about three feet below the rim
of the flower. They were kicking, but with a force growing less every
second. The filaments seemed to be winding about the professor's legs,
holding him in a deadly embrace.
Then the top cover, or flap of the plant, closed down suddenly. The
professor was a prisoner inside.
The plant had turned cannibal and eaten the man who had grown it! For
an instant, fear deprived Adams of reason. He did not know what to do.
Then the awful plight of his friend brought back his senses.
"Professor!" he shouted. "Are you alive? Can you hear me?"
"Yes," came back in faint and muffled tones. "This beast has me, all
right."
Then followed a series of violent struggles that shook the plant.
"I'll get you out. Where's an ax? I'll chop the cursed plant to pieces!"
cried Adams.
"Don't! Don't" came in almost pleading tones from the imprisoned
professor.
"Don't what?"
"Don't hurt my pet!"
"Your pet!" snorted Adams angrily. "Nice kind of a