CUCKOO-PINT, called also lords-and-ladies and wake-robin (Arum maculatum), the only plant of the arum family (Araceae) indubitably native to the British Isles. It is common in woods and hedgerows in England, but probably not wild in Scotland. It grows from a whitish root-stock, which sends up in the spring a few long-stalked, arrow-shaped polished green leaves, often marked with dark blotches. These are followed by the inflores cence, a fleshy spadix bearing in the lower part numerous crowded simple unisexual flowers and continued above into a purplish or yellowish appendage; the spadix is enveloped by a leafy spathe, constricted in the lower part to form a chamber, in which are the flowers. The mouth of this chamber is protected by a ring of hairs pointing downwards, which allow the entrance but prevent the escape of small flies; after fertilization of the pistils the hairs wither. Insects visit the plant, attracted by the foetid smell, and carry the pollen from one spathe to another. As the fruit ripens the spathe withers, and the brilliant red berries are exposed. This interesting aroid occurs in various parts of Europe and also in northern Africa. Its counterpart in eastern North America is the jack-in-the-pulpit. (See ARACEAE, ARUM, JACK-IN-THE-PULPIT.) CUCKOO-SPIT, a frothy secretion found upon various plants and produced by the immature stages of insects known as froghoppers, pertaining to the family Cercopidae of the order Hemiptera. The origin and formation of the froth has been much discussed. It appears that juices of the plant imbibed by the insect, when voided from the alimentary canal, become mixed with the secretion of special abdominal glands which enables the product to maintain its foamy coherence and hold the air-bubbles which are introduced through a special valve. Cuckoo-spit is believed to protect the insects from the attacks of enemies and also from desiccation. The common cuckoo-spit insect of Europe is Philaenus spumarius which also occurs in North America.