GLOW-FLIES. 
109 
that of a stick with the end on fire (but not in flame) 
carried or whirled along by one running swiftly, 
quenched suddenly after a course of a dozen yards, to 
appear again at a similar distance. When slowly 
flying over the grass, the progress of one may often 
be traced by the red glare on the ground beneath ; a 
space of about a yard square being brightly illumi- 
nated, when no light at all reaches the spectator’s eye 
from the body of the insect. 
Whether any light would appear pervading the 
abdomen if the segments were stretched, I cannot 
positively say, for I have not in my journal any note 
on this point. I think not, however ; for in my re- 
peated handlings of these insects and experiments on 
their abdomens, I could scarcely have avoided ex- 
tending the segments, even unintentionally; but I 
am quite certain I never saw any light except in the 
one ventral and the two thoracic spots. If one be 
trodden on, a mass of mixed light remains for some 
minutes among the fragments. The story told by 
Peter Martyr of these Elaters having been hunted 
for, to eat the mosquitoes is sufficiently amusing ; of 
course it is not right to contradict a statement be- 
cause one has never verified it, but I may be per- 
mitted to observe that I utterly disbelieve it. That 
they might afford a substitute for candles in per- 
forming household operations that required no great 
exactness, is certainly true, provided they were 
constantly carried in the fingers; but if put under 
a glass or allowed liberty in a room, as I have abun- 
dantly proved, they very quickly conceal their light. 
I have found too, that one kept beneath a glass 
