l,IOHT-UiVIXG COI.EOl'TEROUS LAUVA. ^7 



lumiuous beam, obviously an iuaect creeping across tbe road before 

 tbeni. He dismounted and picked it up. On taking it into his 

 hand he found that its head gave out a bright red-coloured light 

 like the red danger-lamp of a railway carriage. It was persistent 

 and especially visible on the top and back of the head ; and dowji 

 the side of the body there was a succession of exceedingly bright 

 ■white lights, -which were not visible all at once, or at all events 

 Y/ere not always visible all at once. These lights streamed 

 from the spiracles, and as the insect moved ran in succession, 

 one after the other, from the head to the tail, down the sides 

 like the movement of tlie ribs of a Serpent or the segments of 

 a Worm, or what it really is, the segments of a Caterpillar ; there 

 was another larger light in the tail, which A^as also white and 

 not persistent. Mr. Fry took it home wdth him to try to rear 

 it; but it died in a day or tw'O, and the specimen figured is 

 its mortal remains. His memorandum made at the time is in 

 these words : — 



" No. 3GS. — Eio. — Eed light in the head, white light in the tail, 

 and one light on each side at each segment of the body. Light in 

 the head permanent, the others showing by flashes." 



Mr. Ery remembers once again seeing a specimen at St. Theresa, 

 close to Eio, but he does not recollect what became of it. 



Mr. Frank Miers saw either the present specimen when it was 

 alive, or some other ; and his account of it wholly corresponds with 

 Mr. Fry's. His expression for the colour of the head is that it was 

 "garnet-coloured." 



Mr. John Miers, Juu., met with another specimen independently 

 of Mr. Fry, and, he thinks, sent it home to his father, Mr. John 

 Miers, the celebrated botanist, who, however, does not remember 

 anything of it; nor, so far as a cursory examination of his entomo- 

 logical collection goes, does it appear to be in it. It is not sur- 

 prising, however, that one who had seen the insect in life and 

 been the sender, should have a more vivid recollection regarding 

 the envoi, than the receiver, who could at the utmost have seen 

 no more than such an insignificant brown morsel as that exhibited. 

 Both Mr. John Miers, Jun., and Mr. Frank Miers speak of the 

 specimens they saw being larger than this preserved one ; about 

 an inch in length is their estimate, while the latter is little more 

 than half an inch. 



It is probably to an allied species that Lieut. Oliver, R.A., 

 refers in a paper " On two routes througli Nicaragua," which he 



