INSECT VARIETY. 89 



Female Dragon-flies and flies with brig-ht and metallic coporeal 

 colours may often be noticed reposing- on plants in the sunshine, 

 attracting" ever and anon the attention of some passing- male, who, 

 staying his course, remains for a while, as seized with an ecstasy, 

 suspended over their charms like a hawk marking his quarry, and 

 seeming as if dazed by the glow of pigment beneath him. This 

 is very characteristic of the Libellula and Syriphidte. 



Let u^s pass now from colour to luminosity. That the apterous 

 Glowworm^s '^ love-illumined form " on her mossy couch is a 

 beacon to the vagrant male, Kirby argues from the fact that the 

 light, most brilliant in the female, in some species, if not all, is 

 present only in the season when the sexes are destined to meet, 

 and is strikingly more vivid at the very moment when the meeting 

 takes place. It has also been questioned from negative evidence 

 whether the male is actually drawn by the light ; and in reply to 

 this I can only mention the case of a Glowworm I found among 

 the solitudes of the New Forest one summer^s evening, which, 

 on being brought into a lighted room caused several winged 

 males to enter at the open window. 



To further the union of the sexes, we also notice the male 

 insect is usually smaller, more fleet and agile on the wing, than 

 the female ; and the wings of the latter, often unsuitable for 

 flying, are in some bulky egg-bags so abbreviated as to be 

 scarcely discernible. But in the heath-flying Clouded BufE Moth 

 we have an example of the converse, and instances may be quoted 

 in other orders, consonantly with which, perhaps, we notice the 

 task of aerial locomotion after coupling is indiiferently appor- 

 tioned to the sexes ; or at least, this can be affirmed of those light 

 ethereal forms, the butterflies. For while the Whites, Clouded 

 Yellows, and Meadow Blues spread their limber vans to bear 

 away their brown or daj^pled loves, the Black Veins, crimson- 

 spotted Thais, orange wood Fritillaries, and indigenous Browns, 

 carry their admirer"^ through the liquid sky. 



Aerial display, in which colour, reflection, or luminosity is 

 rendered intermittent by rhythmical motions, originates in love 

 and rivalry, and like sedentary display effects gregariousness. 



* Trans. Soc. Ent. de la France, T. V., p. 79. Butterflies will not pair in 

 confinement. Newport, Trans. Ent. Soc, V. IV., p. 60. 



