416 LUMINOUS INSECTS. 



may convey the light body of an insect to the above- 

 mentioned distance from land, you will not dispute when 

 you call to mind that our friend Hooker, in his interesting 

 Tour in Iceland^ tells us that the ashes from the eruption 

 of one of the Icelandic volcanos in 1755 were conveyed 

 to Ferrol, a distance of upwards of 300 miles*. — Lastly, 

 to conclude my list of luminous insects. Professor Afze- 

 lius observed "a dim phosphoric light" to be emitted 

 from the singular hollow antennae ofPcmsiis sphay-ocenis^'. 

 A similar appearance has been noticed in the eyes of 

 Acronycta Ps?\ Cossus ligniperda, and other moths. 

 Chiroscells hifene&trata of Lamarck, a beetle, has two red 

 oval spots covered with a downy membrane on the se- 

 cond segment of the abdomen, which he thinks indicate 

 some particular organ pcrliaps luminous*^ : and M. La- 

 treille informs me that a friend of his, who saw one living 

 which was brought from China to the Isle of France in 

 wood, found that the ocelli in the elytra of Bupi-cstis 

 ocellata were luminous. 



But besides the insects here enumerated, others may 

 be luminous which have not hitherto been suspected of 

 being so. This seems proved by the following fact. A 

 learned friend'' has informed me, that when he was cu- 

 rate of Ickleton, Cambridgeshire, in 1780, a farmer of 

 that place of the name of Simpringham brought to him 

 a mole-cricket {Gryllotalpa vulgaris^ Latr.), and told 



been recorded, as that in Ilimgary, 20th November ]()73 {Ep/icni. 

 Nat. Curios. 1673. 80.), and one mentioned in tlie newspapers of 

 July 2d, 1810, to have fallen in France the January preceding, ac- 

 companied by a shower of red snow, may evidently be explained in 

 the same manner. 



' p. 407. " Linn. Trans, iv. 261. 



' Latr. JTist. Nat. x. 262. " Kev. Dr. Sutton of Norwich. 



