ENTOMOLOGY. 



the present year, (June, 1825), some additional observations which 

 had been lately communicated on the subject by the same gentleman 

 were also read in the Linnasan Society. This memoir, together with 

 the drawings, have been, at the request of the author and by per- 

 mission of the Linnaean Society, transferred to our hands for the 

 purpose of publication, and we have now the pleasure of submitting 

 to our readers the copies of the drawings, together with such portions 

 of the descriptive matter as we have deemed most applicable to the 

 purpose of our publication ; the originals are of course returned as 

 the property of the Linnaean Society, and are deposited in their 

 library. > 



Nothing, says the Rev, author of this paper, can appear more 

 extraordinary to the stranger on his first visit to the islands of those 

 tropic regions than the swarms of luminous insects which sometimes 

 illuminate the foliage of the trees in the evening, and which in their 

 flight appear like wandering stars while the forests echo with the 

 sounds of others in tones so loud and singular as to excite astonish- 

 ment. The luminous insects we apprehend to be of the Lampyris 

 and Elater tribe, and probably some others with which we remain 

 unacquainted ; the most remarkable of the sonorous kinds is the 



* In Southern Europe such phenomena of the insect tribe are not 

 altogether unknown, although the occurrence is far from common. The 

 most familiar example of luminous insects in the British Isles is the 

 " Glow-worm/' or in the language of science " Lampyris Noctiluca," but in 

 this species the female, which is luminous is apterous, or without wings, 

 while the male, which is winged, is not luminous, so that it is only upon the 

 grassy turf or among the bushes that we observe those brilliant little beiiags 

 of the insect race, and where from the slowness of their motions they appear 

 nearly stationary. In Southern countries, on the contrary, there are 



