S60 HABITS AND INSTINCTS OP ANIMALS. CHAP. XI. 



male (a) only was luminous ; but it is now ascertained 

 that the male insect (b) is so likewise, although in an 

 inferior degree : in the males of L. splendidula and 

 of L.Hemiptera, the light is very distinct, and may 

 be seen in the former while it is flying.* They are 

 all, however, enabled to extinguish or conceal their 

 light at pleasure ; and Mr. White of Selborne seems 

 even to imagine that they put it out regularly be- 

 tween eleven and twelve at night, f Another beetle, 

 of a different genus, the Elater noctilucens of the 

 West Indies (fig. 87.), emits 

 its light from two little trans- 

 parent tubercles on the sides of 

 the thorax. So considerable, in- 

 deed, is this, that one of our 

 most eminent entomologists, an 

 eye-witness to the fact, ob- 

 serves, that, "carrying it along 

 the lines of a book, I could 

 distinctly read them ; and ap- 

 plying it to my watch, I could, 

 without difficulty, ascertain the hour." $ In the 

 West Indies, but more especially in the island of 

 St. Domingo, we are told that the natives anciently 

 employed these creatures instead of candles, to light 

 them in their domestic occupations , a statement, 

 however, which seems to us very questionable. They 

 are said, also, to be still made use of as ornaments, tied 

 upon the clothes of the young people on occasions of 

 festivity, and thus producing, on a dark evening, a 

 most singular but striking effect. || Sixteen species of 

 the luminous Elater s are described by Schonkerr; the 

 larger portion of which inhabit Brazil.^ Besides these, 

 which are all of the coleopterous or beetle order, there 

 is the hemipterous genus of Fulgora, which boasts of 



* Int. to Ent. vol. ii. p. 411. 



f Nat. Hist. vol. ii. p. 279. 



I Mr. Curtis, in Zool. Journ. No. IT. p. 381. 



Int. to Ent. vol. ii. p. 413. |j Id. ibid p. 418. 



1 Zool. Journ. No. XI. p. 280 



