COLEOI'TEKA. — LAMrYUID.T!. 24-9 



to Entomology ; and Dr. Burnieister mentions the curious u.jt, that 

 while catching some of the flying species in his hat, they have so 

 suddenly and entirely ceased to shine, that he has fancied thatthey 

 must have escaped. In the L. noctiluca, the males are but very slightly 

 luminous ; but in most of the large exotic species, the females of wliich 

 are winged, both sexes emit a very strong light. When disturbed, 

 these insects emit a bright but frequently interrupted light ; and when 

 laid upon their backs, they shine without intermission, in consequence 

 of the continual motion of the abdomen, in the endeavours of the in- 

 sect to regain its position. These glowworms have attracted the no- 

 tice of the observers of nature from the earliest periods ; they were 

 termed by the old authors Lampyris, Cicindela, Lucio, Noctiluca, 

 Incendula, Lucernuta, Lucciola, &c. And as they (as well as the 

 luminous Elateridae, witii which they are generally confounded) 

 abound in foreign climes, there is scarcely a book of travels published 

 in which their splendid appearance in equatorial regions*: is not 

 dwelt upon ; whilst their internal anatomy, and the phosphorescent 

 nature of the luminous matter, has occupied the attention of Trevi- 

 ranus, Carradori, Forster, Beckerheim, Carus, Miiller, &c. Mr. Mur- 

 ray, also, in his Exjierimental Researches in Natnrul History, has made 

 the luminosity of the glowworm one of his subjects ; and Mr. Todd, 

 in the forty-second number of the Journal of Science and Art, and 

 Messrs. Macaire and Macartney, in Gilbert's Arm., vols. 61. and 70., 

 have published some observations upon the same subject. From 

 these researches the luminous matter is found to be of a phospho- 

 rescent nature ; although the light is not augmented when placed either 



* In some countries fire-flics in general ai)i>ear to he named Cucuis by tlic natives, 

 a name wliich we have seen is given to the luminous Elaterida', although in some 

 accounts it is evident that the insects thus designated, must be I^ampyrida', the light 

 being only visible when the insects are on the wing, the situation of the luminous 

 spots being on the back of the thorax in the former. This general employment of 

 the term seems to be proved by the statement of P. INIartire, quoted l)y Mouffet, 

 that the Cucuji are caught for the purpose of feeding upon the gnats, where these 

 abound, a circumstance so dillerent from the habits of the Elatcrid.x, that it should 

 evidently be applied to the Lampyrida', which probably, like their allies the Telc- 

 phorida;, feed upon other insects. Dr. Burnieister, indeed, conjectures that the liglit 

 emitted by the Cucuji (which he considers to be Elaterida;) may have the effect of 

 keeping the gnats away ; but which is totally at variance with the habits of the gnat 

 in flying to lights. Mouffet, by whom the account of the Cucujos was quoted, 

 described both the Elateridce and Lampyridue under the name of Cicindela. 



