So many species of the _Buprestidæ_ are clothed with such brilliant colors, that Geoffroy has thought proper to designate them all under the generic appellation of _Richard_. The origin of this name is as singular as its application is fantastical. It was originally given to the Jay, in consequence of the facility with which that bird was taught to pronounce the word.[155] Modern writers have been much divided in their opinion as to what genus the celebrated _Buprestis_ of the ancients belongs. All indeed have regarded it as of the order Coleoptera, but here their agreement ceases. Linnæus seems to have looked upon it as a species of the genus to which he has given its name. Geoffroy thinks it to be a _Carabus_ or _Cicindela_; M. Latrielle, to the genus _Melöe_; and Kirby and Spence to _Mylabris_.[156] Of this Buprestis, Pliny says: “Incorporat with goat sewer, it taketh away the tettars called lichenes that be in the face.”[157] And Dr. James says that insects of this family “are all in common, inseptic, exulcerating, and (possess) a heating quality; for which reason, they are mixed up with medicines adapted to the cure of a Carcinoma, Lepra, and the malignant Lichen. Mixed in emollient pessaries, they provoke the Catamenial discharges.”[158] The Greeks, it is said, commended the Buprestis in food.[159] Elateridæ--Fire-flies, Spring-beetles, etc. In an historical sense, the most interesting species of the family _Elateridæ_ is the _Elater noctilucus_, a native of the West Indies, and called by the inhabitants, _Cucujus_. From an ancient translation of Peter Martyr’s History of the West Indies, we make the following quotation, which contains many curious facts relative to this insect: