THE MOSAIC OF COLOURS 



Both the male and female shine, and even the eggs and larvae. 

 In South Brazil there is a beetle, one of the Malacodermata, whose 

 female, 2 inches in length, emits a coloured light. Explorers who 

 have encountered this grub-like creature creeping over the floor of 

 the forest have spoken with admiration of its fairy-like appearance. 

 The first segment of the body glowed like a red-hot ball of iron; the 

 rest of the body followed like a broad blue, or sometimes yellow, streak 

 of fire, and the constrictions of the segments gave it the appearance 

 of a string of gems. Whenever the insect stretched forth its head 

 one saw that the red stripe that ran down the back was continued 

 on to the head, and since the unlit portions of the head remained 

 invisible it looked as though the beetle was putting forth a fiery 

 tongue, and groping about with it. 



There is a record of a fourth luminous insect having been found 

 in Brazil. In 1705 the naturalist and painter, Maria Sibylla Merian, 

 reported that some natives of Surinam had brought her some 

 insects, some 3 inches in length, with shapeless, bladder-like 

 heads and wings mottled with green and yellow; but the under 

 surface of each of the wings, when these were unfolded, showed a 

 great dark eye. The lady put the insects into a box. At night she 

 heard a sound, and opened the box, only to let it fall, startled by 

 the discovery that the heads of all the insects were blazing like 

 lanterns, so that one could have read the newspaper by the light 

 emitted. Since then these "lantern-bearers," which belong to the 

 Hemiptera, have often been caught, but they have never been 

 known to shine, so that Fraulein Merian's statement has remained 

 an enigma. Nowadays the majority of naturalists give it no credit, 

 but many are of opinion that the lantern-bearers shine only at 

 certain times, perhaps during the mating-season, as is said to be 

 the case with certain of their relatives in China, and that hitherto 

 only this lady has had the good luck to see the insect at the critical 

 period. 



The human eye is an organ born of the light and turning to the 

 light. When night falls upon the earth it still longs for the light, and 

 our hearts greet with joy every spark that breaks through the 

 darkness. And there is something fairy-like and fabulous in the 

 green wandering lights whose bearers remain invisible. They seem 

 like the souls of creatures to which the meadows and thickets have 

 given birth in the silence of the night, and which by their soundless 

 dance express their mysterious emotions. 



