CHAPTER OF VARIETIES. 



519 



Luminosity of the sea. — On the evening of the 6'th June, 1824, 

 not having been able to cross the bar with a full tide, we coasted on 

 the outside of the harbour of Bombay, when I observed a remarkable 

 luminous appearance of the sea. The whole ocean around us was as 

 a mass of flowing molten gold. The soft balmy breeze propelled us 

 forward at about five knots an hour; «the night warm ; the moon hid 

 beneath a dark cloud, but a countless host of stars shone with all their 

 radiance, brilliantly sparkling, seeming to allure the eye from gazing 

 on the splendour of the rolling waves to behold their humbler beauties. 

 Instead of the pale phosphoric light that danced before the prow of the 

 vessel, in those tiny stars pillowed on the foam of the ocean, this had 

 all the rich hues of metallic lustre. I resided upwards of six months 

 afterwards in Bombay, but had not the opportunity of again indulging 

 myself with such a sight. Perhaps some of your correspondents may 

 be able to describe the cause of these {{ ruddy flames." 



At different periods of the voyage, about nine or ten at night, several 

 of us were accustomed to go to the prow of the vessel, and bathe 

 ourselves, when the weather permitted, by drawing water up in buckets, 

 throwing it over each other ; the sparks of liquid fire would attach 

 themselves to the skin, and in an instant their light was extinguished, 

 unless occasionally, in applying the towel, a few solitary ones seemed to 

 be re-ignited. But one circumstance occurred in this practice, that led 

 me to consider the cause, not as a phosphoric matter contained in the 

 water, as some have conjectured, but a living creature : as in using 

 soap, though at first these sparks were elicited, so soon as any thing 

 like a diffusion of it was obtained, all was dark. The same invariably 

 occurred in washing ourselves in tubs, or other vessels ; the alkali in 

 every instance depriving the insect of life. 



L. W. Clarke. 



Birmingham. 



Magpie moth refused by birds. — Can any reader inform me 

 what peculiarity there is in the chemical composition of the common 

 magpie moth, {Abraxas grossidcwiata) , that all my various insectivorous 

 birds invariably reject it ? I have a nightingale which will readily take 

 food from the hand, and which, like all other small insectivorous birds, 

 is most voraciously fond of lepidopterous insects, in general ; but the 

 magpie moth he constantly refuses, though I have seen him swallow in 

 succession three or four of the large yellow underwings { Triphama) 

 I once even kept my insect-eating birds without food beyond their 



VOL. I. NO. XII. (DECEMBER, 1833.) U U 



