540 History of Luminescence 



which Bacon was acquainted, is an adult female of a particular 

 species of the firefly family, whose male is winged. In other species 

 both male and females can fly, whereas in all species the larvae are 

 wingless. The relation between the creeping and the flying glow- 

 worm (or firefly) was to perplex and to confuse naturalists for some 

 years to come. Another question for philosophic discussion had to 

 do with the use of the light and a third was whether the animal 

 could shine after death. 



It will be recalled that an early pronouncement on the last ques- 

 tion had been made by Fabio Columna. J. C. Scaliger ^ also, had 

 previously stated (in 1557) that " with the breath of life this light 

 departs from the cicindela," although he was relating the opinion 

 of others rather than personal observation. The Scaliger quotation 

 is taken from Thomas Bartholin, who devoted considerable space 

 in his book to the glowworm. Bartholin wrote: ^ " i tried to check 

 on the truthfulness of this experiment [on light after death] and 

 set aside a wingless noctiluca. But while I was waiting for the result 

 it cleverly escaped and with itself took away its light." Thus was a 

 laudable impulse foiled by capriciousness of experimental material. 



Bartholin discussed ^ particularly the relation of winged to wing- 

 less glowworms, giving the credit for correct interpretation to: 



Carolus Vintimillia of Palermo, Sicily, who guided by his extraordi- 

 nary genius, confined both kinds of lampyrides to the same glass and 

 diagnosed the distinction in sex very well from their mating behaviour. 

 He has written about this experiment faithfully in a letter to Fabius 

 Columna and said that the winged cicindelae in his region were not dif- 

 ferent from the noctilucae, but the former ones were males, the latter 

 females, as he had found out twice. He had obtained quite a few, which 

 he caught at random, kept in his glass container, and taken pleasure in 

 watching at night, feeding them with moist bread. One night at dinner a 

 winged one flew around his light. He caught it and put it in the glass 

 with the others. While he continuously watched, it overcame another 

 one and hung on to it, as is the custom of the silk-worm.* Finally, wrested 

 from the first, he paired with one after the other, and, as he found out 

 later, with all of them. On the following day they produced seeds of 

 the shape and color of the millet, but smaller than those of the silk- 

 worm, and after a few days died. He saved the seeds or eggs, but found 

 them damaged and cracked in the middle, perhaps because they required 

 a moist place. A striking feature of the eggs was that they were distin- 



^ In Exotericarum exercitationum, etc., 194, n. 3, Paris, 1557. 



^ De luce animalium (1647, Book II, Chap. II), translated by Mrs. Annemarie 

 Holborn. 



* Both Muffet (1634) and Jonston (1653) credit J. C. Scaliger (1557) with having 

 first observed copulation of cicindelae, while John Ray in Travels through the low 

 countries, etc. (1673) again referred to the letter of Vintimillia to F. Columna. 



