8ERR1CORNIA. 129 



September; Mickleham and Caterham (Chnmpioa); Tunbridge Well*; Ash ford ; 

 Sandwich; Norfolk; Arnmlfl ; Shepherd's Well (\Vaterhou8e) ; Woodland, Devon 

 ( Leach) ; Leigh Woods, Bristol (in some numbers, Rye and others) ; Scarborough 

 (Lawson). 



LAMPYRID2E. 



This is a large and important family, the memhers of which are 

 characterized by having the trochanters applied obliquely to the femora, 

 and the tarsnl claws often bifid ; the antennae are either serrate or 

 broadly flabellate or biflalsellate, or simple; the abdominal segments iu 

 the male are often incised in various fashions ; the anterior and inter- 

 mediate coxae are contiguous, and the abdomen is composed of seven 

 ventral segments ; the tarsi are 5-jointed, and have the fourth joint 

 emarginate. Most of the species have the power of emitting light from 

 the posterior abdominal segments, but this power is by no means 

 universal ; in some genera, as in our common glow-worm, the females 

 have the wings very much shortened, rudimentary, or absent, and much 

 resemble the larvae in general appearance ; the large majority, however, 

 of the species which belong to the family have as ample wings in the 

 female as in the male ; in the case of those species in which the females 

 are larviform, the males have the eyes very strongly developed, wherett 

 in thr females they are small ; in those species, however, in which both 

 the male and female are winged, the eyes present but slight differences in 

 size ; this fact of itself is sufficient to prove that the light-giving 

 power of the female is bestowed upon it to attract the male. 



The Lampyridae are, as a rule, inhabitants of the tropics ; they are 

 very poorly represented in Europe by six genera and about forty species, 

 of which the best known are the glow-worms (Lampyris), and the 

 Mediterranean " fire-flies " (Luciold) ; only two genera and two species 

 are found in Britain. 



I. Male with elytra and wings fully developed ; antennas very 

 short, not reaching ba>e of thorax ; prothoracic stigma 



large and open LAMPTHIS, L. 



II. Male apterous, with elytra much abbreviated; antenna) 



comparatively long ; prothoracic stigma hidden .... PHOSPH.ENUS, Lap. 



LAMPYRIS, Linne*. 



This genus contains more than fifty species, which are widely distri- 

 buted, representatives occurring in Ceylon, Java, Chili, South Africa, 

 &c., and reaching as far north as Siberia ; the genus Lampyris proper, 

 however, does not appear to bo found in North America ; the males are 

 furnished with ample elytra and wings, ami very large eyes ; the females 

 are larviform, and entirely destitute of l>'th elytra and wings, nnd have 

 the luminous power strongly developed ; in both sexes the head is 

 covered by a prolongation of the prothorax, which, however, especially 

 in the male, is transparent in front of the eyes ; no le:..$ than twenty-one 



VOL. IV. K 



