127 



Buchanan, in his " Christian Researches in Asia," 

 mentions writing one of his letters under the nest of 

 this bird, which had lighted it up with fire-flies, "as 

 if," he facetiously remarks, " to see company." 



Of luminous insects in this country, the lampyris 

 noctiluca, or glow-worm, and the scolopendra electrica 

 and scolopendra phosphorea, are the most conspicuous and 

 common. Kirby and Spence state that some insects, 

 not commonly suspected, may, under peculiar circum- 

 stances, evolve light, such as the mole cricket (gryllus 

 gryllotalpa) ; and, on the authority of Dr. Sutton, it is 

 even conjectured that the ignis fatuus may be of this 

 description. We have elsewhere described a pheno- 

 menon of this kind witnessed by us in Hertfordshire 

 last summer, apparently connected with the presence 

 of a luminous insect. * The scolopendra electrica we 

 first found in Huntingdonshire, and the lampyris noc- 

 tiluca most abundantly in the vicinity of Oswestry, 

 which indeed seems a prolific region for them. It had 

 been supposed, that the property of emitting light was 

 confined to the female in the lampyris noctiluca. Ray 

 first pointed out that the male insect also yielded light, 

 and the circumstance was confirmed by Geoffrey and 

 Miiller. In the males of lampyris splendidula, and 

 lampyris hemiptera, the light is distinct, and may be 

 recognised when the insect is on the wing, but is of 

 inferior brilliancy, and confined to minute points. 

 The glow-worm, in the case of the larva and perfect 

 insect, have different degrees of luminosity, and some- 

 times may have been confounded together. It has 

 been observed, that the females of the glow-worm can 

 occasionally conceal or eclipse their light and it may 

 be to secure themselves from becoming the prey of the 



* See " A Treatise on Atmospherical Electricity," Whittaker, 

 1830. 2d edition. 



G 4 



