334 



3 A TURA L UIS TOR Y. 



covering the head, and by their power of emitting light. This striking phenomenon, which has 

 attracted popular attention in all countries where species of the family are found, is due, as in the 

 Fire-flies, to phosphorescent particles concentrated in certain parts of the body. In the Fire-flies the 

 sacs of luminous matter are contained in the prothorax ; in the Lampyridae they are localised in two or 

 three of the abdominal segments. The two eminent anatomists, Kolliker and Macaire, are agreed that 

 the granules which give forth the light are of albuminous nature ; but Matteucci has assured himself 

 by chemical analysis that they do not contain phosphorus. He says the luminous granules form part 

 of a yellowish pulpy tissue lying underneath the ti-ansparent plates of the abdomen, which are visible 

 in all Lampyridae possessing the faculty, even in the dried specimens. This mass of tissue is permeated 

 with nerves, and with ramifications of fine tracheae, or tubes : the one supplying the air to feed the 

 combustion which goes on when the light is shining, and the other the stimulus of the will of the 

 insect. This description applies to the common European species (Lampyris noctilucci), abundant in 

 many of the English southern counties. In this, as is well known, the female is wingless, resembling 

 the larva state of the species, and gives forth a more brilliant light than the winged male. In very 

 many exotic species both sexes are winged, some of the larger ones emitting a very conspicuous light, 

 which, when many hundreds are seen at once as often happens on dark sultry nights in the tropics 

 form a very beautiful sight, the phosphorescent lamps glittering in the bushes, or slowly moving and 

 inter-crossing in the air, as the insects fly from tree to tree. Observers are agreed that these lamps 

 serve as beacons to attract the sexes to one another ; and the Rev. H. S. Gorham, who has studied a 



great diversity of species 



belonging to the family 

 from all countries, made 

 the curious observation 

 that the different species 

 vary greatly in the area 

 of the luminous surface 

 and in the .size of the 

 eyes, and that the eyes 

 are developed in inverse 

 proportion to the lumi- 

 nosity. He further re- 

 marks that wherever the 

 light- emitting surface is 

 confined to small spots 

 only, and the eyes also 

 are small, the antennae 

 present a high degree of 

 development, being plu- 

 mose, or branched like a 

 feather, a structure which 

 admits of a large extent 

 of sensitive, probably 



auditory, surface, a change of form the more significant, inasmuch as the Lampyridae with large 

 eyes, or with a high degree of luminosity, have simple and often short tln-ead-like antennae 



All known Lampyridae are nocturnal in their habits, concealing themselves by day under dead 

 leaves or about the roots of herbage. They are supposed to be vegetable feeders in their adult state ; 

 but the larvae are carnivorous, feeding on land molluscs, in the interior of the shells of which the 

 insects may often be found. The species we figure is the Lanipyris splendidida, an inhabitant of 

 Central and Southern Europe. Upwai-ds of 500 species of this family are known, by far the greater 

 number belonging to America, North and South. 



The sul>family TELEPIIORINJE consists of species having a more elongated and narrower form 

 than the preceding, with longer legs, and head not covered by the prothorax ; one of the genera which 

 connects the sub-family with the Glowworms is luminous. The family is abundantly represented in 



LAMPYKIS SPLEXDIDULA. 



