(591.57 17 



1595.4 



I. 



How and Why Scorpions Hiss. 



To many residents in India, especially to those interested in natural 

 history, it is possibly a well-known fact that the large black 

 scorpions of that country will frequently emit distinctly audible sounds 

 under the stimulus of fear or of anger. Possibly, indeed, the circum- 

 stance has been regarded as so well known that few have considered 

 it as deserving of special mention. For example, in the following 

 passages, published in Nature, in 1879, in connection with the suicide 

 of scorpions, the observer is evidently unaware of the interest attach- 

 ing to the words that we have italicised. After describing how he 

 procured a specimen of " the common black scorpion of Southern 

 India " [doubtless Scorpio ftilvipes] , and placed it for safety " into a 

 glazed entomological case," Mr. W. G. Bidie says ..." taking 

 a common botanical lens I focussed the rays of the sun on its back. 

 The moment this was done it began to run hurriedly about the case, 

 hissing and spitting in a very fierce ivay. This experiment was repeated 

 some four or five times with like results, but on trying it once again 

 the scorpion turned up its tail and plunged the sting, quick as light- 

 ning, into its own back." It will be noticed that the " hissing and 

 spitting " of the scorpion are here referred to quite incidentally, and 

 are merely thrown in as an item of " corroborative detail, to give 

 artistic verisimilitude to the narrative " ; and it may be safely assumed 

 that the observation would never have been recorded in this case had 

 it not been for its intimate connection with the fancied self-destruction 

 of the chief actor in the tragedy described. 



This little anecdote has been quoted, not because it is the first 

 record of the ' hissing ' powers of the Indian scorpions, but because 

 it affords an illustration of the possibility of the fact being a matter of 

 common knowledge to many of those who had fallen in with these 

 animals in the Oriental Region prior to 1877. Possibly, indeed, the 

 occurrence had been noticed in print before that date ; but Professor 

 Wood-Mason evidently believed the fact to be new to science when 

 he read a paper on the " Stridulation of Scorpions," before the 

 Entomological Society of London in September of that year. At all 

 events, there is no reason to suppose that the organ by which the 

 ' hissing ' is produced had been previously discovered or described ; 

 and as a tribute to the acumen of this naturalist it may be added that 



c 



