The sponge has the most remarkable powers of regeneration of lost parts known in nature. It can regrow its entire body from a small fragment of itself. Thus if a sponge were cut into fine parts and each fragment cemented to a bit of rock each would grow into a complete, normal animal. Also if a sponge is cut or torn away from the sea bottom in such a way that some fragment remains attached this fragment will continue growing. _Living “Stars” in Caves_ There is a cathedral-like grotto under the earth whose roof is lit eternally by living stars. It is an enormous labyrinthine chamber cut by a slow-flowing river in the base of a limestone mountain. Its dome is like the dome of the heavens on a frosty October night. There shine the Big Dipper, the Southern Cross and the Belt of Orion. The Clouds of Magellan are on the southern horizon. There are millions of pale stars grouped in all sorts of astrological configurations. Some are isolated in space. Some are packed in dense galaxies. There are black voids between them, like the curtain of star dust that hides the center of the universe. They are only a few feet overhead. One can reach up and pluck these stars, one by one, out of the sky. Unlike the heavenly bodies, they do not twinkle. They shine steadily in complete motionlessness. Pale and weird, they illumine a realm of eternal night. It is a domain of absolute silence. Around the walls the strange starlight falls on carved figures of winged angels, of human faces laughing and human faces contorted in agony. Each star is a predacious living animal, a flesh-hungry hunter and killer. From it is suspended four or five foot-long strings of shining pearls, so delicate that they shimmer at a human breath. This star-lit cave near the little city of Te Awaamutu is New Zealand’s greatest curiosity and certainly one of the weirdest and most intriguing spots on earth. The grotto constitutes about a third of the Waitome caverns in the center of Maoriland in the North Island, otherwise rather featureless, water-chiseled rooms in the depths of a mountain with the customary stalagmite and stalactite formations. The stars are luminous, slimy, dirty-grey worms. They are rarely found anywhere else, and never in very great numbers. This is the one spot on earth ideally adapted to their unbelievably queer life cycle. The worm is the larva of a dainty, dark-winged fly about twice as large as a mosquito, which looks like a miniature daddy longlegs. It has no common name. Scientifically it is classified as Boletophela luminosa, a member of the sub-order of arachenocampa. It falls somewhere between true insects and spiders. There is no relationship between it and any other luminous insect—glow-worm or firefly—anywhere.