8 



long kept secret, can apply themselves with renewed energy to the task of 

 discovering the identity of the perfect insect. 



This luminous larva has proved to be the form of the female in a Lam- 

 pyrid beetle, better known as Zarhipis Riversi Horn. Or if not a perfectly 

 metamorphosed female, possesses the powers of that sex to produce ova 

 and attract the male. The grub or larva had fed all winter, and in March 

 sloughed its skin and remained motionless, coiled in a cell of earth, for 

 three weeks, and kept a uniform pale-cream color without luminosity, but 

 gradually the center of the dorsal plates became darker, and in the ratio 

 of coloring so was the reappearance of the phosphorescent light; when fully 

 restored in strength it became very active and strongly luminous, but it did 

 not eat. In about a week ft disappeared beneath the earth, and remained 

 out of sight for nearly a month, and thinking it had changed into the pupa 

 state I disturbed it, and found no change to have taken place. I returned 

 it to the jar, placing the coiled insect upon the top of the earth, where it lay 

 motionless for two days. On the morning of the third day I found it had 

 sloughed another skin, but this time a very. thin covering of uniform pale 

 brown, and the insect itself had disappeared into the earth. This last dor- 

 mant stage seems to represent its pupa state. I unearthed it again and 

 found it very soon afterwards to assume great activity and bright lumin- 

 osity, but it would take none of the usual food. Taking the jar which con- 

 tained this insect into the open air for the purpose of supplying it with fresh 

 earth, and while doing so, several male specimens came flying around the 

 jar, and one example dropped swiftly upon what had been supposed to be 

 the larval form. The male soon attempted copulation. The attraction of 

 the female was perfect, and by it I captured eleven males. The eleven 

 males attracted were not all of the form known as Z. River si Horn, some 

 represent the Z. piciventris Lee., and these facts will cause a revision of the 

 genus, and the four species will be reduced one under the name of Zarhipis 

 integripennis Lee. 



Description of a form of the female: 



Apterous, vermiform, segmented, retractile, phosphorescent. Number 

 of joints, exclusive of the head, twelve. Legs, six; two on each of the 

 three anterior segments, or on those portions underneath representing the 

 pro, meso, and metasternum. Length, when extended in walking, two 

 and a quarter inches; and the width, across the widest part, five sixteenths 

 of an inch. 



Head, corneous, shining black, and not well defined, and when at rest, 

 hidden beneath the anterior segment. The prominent character of the 

 head consists of a pair of curved, hook-like mandibles, like those of the 

 male. Antennae, short, straight, four-jointed; the apical joint bristle-like, 

 and growing from the side, at the end of the previous joint, which is the 

 largest, and tubular in form. 



Maxillary palpi, five-jointed, four being nearly equal and bead-like. 



Labial palpi appear two-jointed. The antennae and palpi being short, 

 stand stiffly out from their base. 



Dorsal surface consists of twelve thin corneous plates, the three anterior 

 being narrowed in front, and all having an impressed line through the 

 longitudinal center. The plates are shining, blackish brown, marginal 

 transversely with transparent olive green, and upon the side margins with 

 opaque pale-yellow, interspersed with olive, which colors intermixed obtain 

 upon the sides arid under parts generally. 



Spiracles upon the sides of the fourth to the eleventh segments, inclusive, 

 and just below the spiracles on the same segments is a double fold, form- 



