The Nineteenth Century 223 



except in flying insects, which by that means discover each other at 

 night, for the purpose of sexual congress. 



Macartney's facts regarding the necessity of air were incorrect, 

 based on experiments using impure gases, but most of his state- 

 ments were true and he was one of the first to emphasize the part 

 played by a stimulus in light production. Although Alexander von 

 Humboldt (1769-1859) was actually the first to stimulate a luminous 

 animal electrically (a medusa in 1799) , Macartney was the second to 

 carry out the experiment and particularly to note the importance 

 of electricity as a method of excitation. 



GOTTFRIED REINHOLD TREVIRANUS 



One of the first scientists to take a really broad view of biological 

 phenomena, as contrasted with those who classified animals, was 

 Gottfried Reinhold Treviranus ^^ (1776-1837) professor of medi- 

 cine and mathematics at the Bremen Lyceimi, a man of broad bio- 

 logical interests. He wrote a sixty-eight-page article on the gen- 

 eral subject, " Phosphorische Erscheinungen der Organische Natur " 

 (1818), for his Biologie oder Philosophie der lebenden Natur fiir 

 Naturforscher und Aertze, a six-volume work which appeared be- 

 tween 1802 and 1822. A similar section, " Phosphorescence der 

 Organische Wesen," appeared in his two-volume work, Die Erschein- 

 ungen und Gesetze des Organischen Leben (1831, 1833). The 

 treatise on luminescence in the Biologie was divided into four sec- 

 tions: (1) Phosphorescence of living organisms; (2) Phosphores- 

 cence of dead plants and animals; (3) Development of fire (Feuer) 

 in men's bodies; (4) General results of the investigations. The 

 second book. Die Erscheinu7igen, 1: 432-447) devotes less space to 

 luminescence but in both, Treviranus described most of the classic 

 bioluminescences — sponges, medusae, Beroe, pennatulids, alcyo- 

 narians and gorgonians, Pyrosoma, branchiopods, Pholas, Cyclops 

 brevicornis of O. F. Miiller, Cancer fulgens of Banks and Cancer 

 pulex of Thulis and Bernard, Scolopendra electrica, marine worms, 

 earthworms, Elater, lampyrids, Scarabaeus phosphoricus of Luce, 

 Paussus sphaerocerus of Afzelius, Bupestris ocellata of Latreille, 

 Gryllus gryllotalpa of Kirby and Spence, Fulgora of Merian, and 

 Culex pipiens of Hablizl. 



Among luminous plants he mentioned Aristotle's fungus; Hum- 

 boldt's Byssus phosphorea, an example of the subterranean rhi- 

 zomorphs; Schistostega osmundacea; Confervae described by Duc- 



'* Not to be confused with L. C. Treverinus of Breslau, who also wrote on lumi- 

 nescence (1829) . 



