LUMINOUS INSECTS. 405 



motions, while it is incapable of burning ; and whose 

 lustre is maintained without needing fresh supplies of 

 oil or the application of the snuffers. 



Of the insects thus singularly provided, the common 

 glow-worm (Lampyris noctiluca) is the most familiar 

 instance. Who that has ever enjoyed the luxury of a 

 summer evening's walk in the country, in the southern 

 parts of our island, but has viewed with admiration . 

 these " stars of the earth and diamonds of the night?" 

 And if, living like me in a district where it is rarely met 

 with, the first time you saw this insect, chanced to be, 

 as it was in my case, one of those delightful evenings 

 which an English summer seldom yields, when not a 

 breeze disturbs the balmy air, and " every sense is joy," 

 and hundreds of these radiant worms, studding their 

 mossy couch with mild effulgence, were presented to 

 your wondering eye in the course of a quarter of a mile, 

 you could not help associating with the name of glow- 

 worm the most pleasing recollections. No wonder that 

 an insect, which chiefly exhibits itself on occasions so 

 interesting, and whose economy is so remarkable, should 

 have afforded exquisite images and illustrations to those 

 poets who have cultivated Natural History. 



If you take one of these glow-worms home with you 

 for examination, you will find that in shape it somewhat 

 resembles a caterpillar, only that it is much more de- 

 pressed ; and you will observe that the light proceeds 

 from a pale-coloured patch that terminates the underside 

 of the abdomen. It is not, however, the larva of an 

 insect, but the perfect female of a winged beetle, from 

 which it is altogether so different, that nothing but ac- 

 tual observation could have inferred the fact of their 



