36 STARLIGHT AND SUNSHINE. 
Goethe also discerned a similar luminous aureole around the 
poppy, but explained it as a “spectral image in complementary 
color”; an instance, it seems to me, of where the poet's vision 
was more keen and philosophic than that of the scientist. This 
spectral image can be evoked by any one in a simple philosophic 
experiment. A moment’s steady gaze at the left side of a blos- 
som cluster, the eyes being then instantly turned to the opposite 
side, will reveal the colored aureole around this portion of the 
cluster, and always in the complementary hue—a halo which 
plays incessantly around the petals as the eyes are shifted. Thus 
the spectre of the poppy is a ghostly green-white; that of the 
primrose is purple. 
Whether or not the primrose is thus endowed may be simi- 
larly demonstrated by any one, and I think it will be found, as in 
the writer’s experience, that the brightest cluster, however luminous 
‘it may appear in its haunt as a condensing mirror of the midnight 
sky, will be invisible in a perfectly dark closet — conditions under 
‘which true phosphorescence would glow with added brilliancy. 
I have observed this same luminous deception prettily illus- 
trated in the instance of the pondweed (Utricularia), with its 
, floating candlestick dancing on the ripples, the faint light from 
its yellow petals attended by numerous circling moths. 
But we are not without numerous examples of true phospho- 
rescence among our vegetation, for the “fox-fire” of the midnight 
‘forest is a true plant. How it gleams in the dank nocturnal 
oods !—most brilliant in the deepest recesses, as though feeding 
‘its fire from the very darkness. There is a whole tribe of these 
phosphorescent fungi—luminous moulds, mushrooms, and_toad- 
stools. They shine through crevices in the bark of trees or 
among the leafy loam. They glare at you with true feline sug- 
| gestiveness from the deep hole in decayed tree or shadowy den 
| amid the rocks. Following the hint of a peeping speck of fire, 
I have torn the bark from a decayed prostrate trunk in the 
woods, and liberated a flood of brilliant light covering several 
square feet in area. 
Hawthorne, among his reminiscent sketches, relates a similar 
