Poachers and Poaching

by F.L.S. John Watson

Standing in one of the rides of a woodland glade just as day is departing, one is pierced, thrilled by a perfect storm of song. This loud swelling volume of sound softens as the darkness deepens, and then only the polyglot wood-thrush is heard. The stem of the silver birch has ceased to vibrate to the blackbird's whistle, and as darkness comes a new set of sounds take possession of the night. But passing down through the meadows we have other thoughts than listening to these.

Another night singer is the blackcap. The flute-like mellowness and wild sweetness of its song give it a high place among British warblers—next only to the nightingale. The blackcap has neither the fulness nor the force, but it has all and more of the former's purity. This little hideling, with its timid obtrusiveness, never strays far from cultivation. One provision it requires, and this is seclusion. Its shy and retiring habits teach it to search out dense retreats, and it is rarely seen. If observed on the confines of its corral of boughs it immediately begins to perform a series of evolutions until it has placed a dense screen of brushwood between itself and the observer.

Many times have we heard the round, full, lute-like plaintiveness of the nightingale, sounds that seem to seize and ingrain themselves in the very soul, that "make the wild blood start in its mystic springs." To us the delicious triumph of the bird's song lies in its utter abandon. The lute-like sweetness, the silvery liquidness, the bubbling and running over, and the wild, gurgling "jug, jug, jug!" To say this, and more—that the nightingale is a mad, sweet polyglot, that it is the sweetest of English warblers, the essence and quintessence of song, that it is the whole wild bird achievement in one—these are feeble, feeble! This "light-winged dryad of the trees" is still "in some melodious spot of beechen green and shadows numberless, singing of summer in full-throated ease," and here she will remain. Unlike the songs of some of our warblers, hers can never be reproduced. Attempt to translate it, and it eludes you, only its meagre skeleton remains. Isaac Walton, in his quaint eloquence, tries to say what he felt: "The nightingale, another of my airy creatures, breathes such sweet, loud music out of her little instrumental throat, that it might make mankind to think miracles are not ceased. He that at midnight … should hear, as I have very often, the clear airs, the sweet descants, the natural rising and falling, the doubling and redoubling of her voice, might well be lifted above earth, and say, 'Lord, what music hast Thou provided for the saints in heaven, when Thou affordest bad men such music on earth!'"

Although Britain can show no parallel either in number or brilliance to the living lights of the tropics, we are not without several interesting phosphorescent creatures of our own. Those whose business leads them abroad in the fields and woods through the short summer nights are often treated to quite remarkable luminous sights. Last night the writer was lying on a towering limestone escarpment, waiting to intercept a gang of poachers. The darkness was dead and unrelieved, and a warm rain studded every grass blade with moisture. When the day and sun broke, this would glow with a million brilliant prismatic colours, then suddenly vanish. But the illumination came sooner, and in a different way. The rain ceased, and hundreds of tiny living lights lit up the sward. In the intense darkness these shone with an unusual brilliancy, and lit up the almost impalpable moisture. Every foot of ground was studded with its star-like gem, and these twinkled and shone as the fireflies stirred in the grass. The sight was quite an un-English one, and the soft green glow only paled at the coming of day. One phase of this interesting phenomenon is that now we can have a reproduction of it nightly. The fireflies were collected, turned down on the lawn, and their hundred luminous lamps now shed a soft lustre over all the green.

Why our British fireflies are designated "glow-worms" is difficult to understand. Lampyris noctiluca has nothing worm-like about it. It is a true insect. The popular misconception has probably arisen in this wise. The female glow-worm, the light-giver, is wingless; the male is winged. The latter, however, has but little of the light emitting power possessed by the female. Only the light-givers are collected, and being destitute of the first attribute of an insect, wings, are set down in popular parlance as worms. Old mossy banks, damp hedgerows, and shaded woods are the loved haunts of the fireflies, and the warm nights of the soft summer months most induce them to burn their soft lustre. Some widowed worm or firefly flirt may shed her luminous self in the darkness even on into dying summer or autumn. But this is unusual. It is not definitely known what purpose is served by the emission of the soft green light, but it has long been suspected that the lustre was to attract the male. Gilbert White found that glow-worms were attracted by the light of candles, and many of them came into his parlour. Another naturalist by the same process captured as many as forty male glow-worms in an evening. Still another suggestion is that the phosphorescence serves for a protection or means of defence to the creatures possessing it, and an incident which seems to support this view has been actually witnessed. This was in the case of a carabeus which was observed running round and round a phosphorescent centipede, evidently wishing but not daring to attack it. A third explanation of the phenomenon is that it serves to afford light for the creature to see by. A somewhat curious confirmation of this is the fact that in the insect genus to which our British fireflies belong, the Lampyridæ, the degree of luminosity is exactly in inverse proportion to the development of the vision.

Fireflies glow with greatest brilliancy at midnight. Their luminosity is first seen soon after dark:

"The glow-worm shows the matin to be near,

And 'gins to pale his ineffectual fire."

As the insects rest on the grass and moss, the difference in the amount of light emitted is quite marked. While the luminous spot indicated by a female is quite bright, the males show only as the palest fire. When on the wing, the light of the latter is not seen at all. Heavy rain, so long as it is warm, serves only to increase the brightness. The seat of the light of the glow-worm is in the tail, and proceeds from three luminous sacs in the last segment of the abdomen. The male has only two of these, and the light proceeding from them is comparatively small. During favourable weather the light glows steadily, but at other times it is not constant. The fireflies of the tropics—those comprising the genus Lampyridæ—vary to the extent that while certain species control their light, others are without this power. The light of our English glow-worm is undoubtedly under its control, as upon handling the insect it is immediately put out. It would seem to take some little muscular effort to produce the luminosity, as one was observed to move continually the last segment of the body so long as it continued to shine. The larvæ of the glow-worm is capable of emitting light, but not to be compared to that of the developed insect. Both in its nature and immature forms, Lampyris noctiluca plays a useful part in the economy of Nature. To the agriculturist and fruit-grower it is a special friend. Its diet consists almost wholly of small shelled snails, and it comes upon the scene just as these farm and garden pests are most troublesome. British fireflies probably have never yet figured as personal ornaments to female beauty. This is, and has always been, one of their uses to the dusky daughters of the tropics. They are often studded in the coiled and braided hair, and perform somewhat the same office as diamonds for more civilised belles. Spanish ladies and those of the West Indies enclose fireflies in bags of lace or gauze, and wear them amid their hair or disposed about their persons. The luminosity of our modest English insect is far outshone by several of its congeners. Some of these are used in various ways for illumination, and it is said that the brilliancy of the light is such that the smallest print can be read by that proceeding from the thoracic spots alone, when a single insect is moved along the lines. In the Spanish settlements, the fireflies are frequently used in a curious way when travelling at night. The natives tie an insect to each great toe; and on fishing and hunting expeditions make torches of them by fastening several together. The same people have a summer festival at which the garments of the young people are covered with fireflies, and being mounted on fine horses similarly ornamented, the latter gallop through the dusk, the whole producing the effect of a large moving light.

Another phosphorescent little creature found commonly in Britain is a centipede with the expressive name Geophilus electricus. This is a tiny living light which shows its luminous qualities in a remarkable and interesting fashion. It may not uncommonly be seen on field and garden paths, and leaves a lovely train of phosphorescent fire as it goes. This silvery train glows in the track of the insect, sometimes extending to twenty inches in length. In addition to this, its phosphorescence is exhibited by a row of luminous spots on each side its body, and these points of pale fire present quite a pretty sight when seen under favourable circumstances. It has been stated that the light-giving quality of the fireflies might be designed to serve them to see by; but this fails to apply to the little creature under notice, as it is without eyes.