356 



Notes on the Larval Forms of Ortonia and Icerya. 



By R. T. Lewis, F.R.M.S. 



{Read December 28th, 1888.) 

 Plate XXVII. 



It will probably be within the recollection of some of the 

 members of the Club that in June last I brought to one of the 

 meetings some living specimens of Coccida? which had been 

 forwarded by Mr. J. R. Ward, of Richmond, Natal, to my friend 

 Mr. George Henderson, the Editor of the " British Bee Journal." 

 Having taken them to the British Museum without being able to 

 obtain any definite information about them, at the suggestion of 

 our Vice-President, Mr. A. D. Michael, I placed myself in com- 

 munication with Mr. J. W. Douglas, of Lewisham, to whom I 

 forwarded specimens, together with such particulars as had come 

 to hand. Having at his request subsequently furnished him with 

 drawings of the legs and antennas, he determined them to belong 

 to the genus Ortonia, but regarding them as a hitherto undescribed 

 species, gave to them the specific name of Natalensis, under which 

 title they formed the subject of an interesting note by him in the 

 14 Entomologists' Monthly Magazine," Vol. xxv., p. 86, 1888. 

 These creatures came through the post in a match box, and had 

 apparently beguiled the tedium of the voyage by laying innumer- 

 able eggs of a delicate pink coral colour, minutely spotted with a 

 darker tint. Some of these eggs I carefully secured in glass 

 cells for future observation and experiment, the remainder I 

 as carefully collected and destroyed as a precaution against 

 the possible association of my name with the introduction of 

 a new garden pest to this country. The adult specimens were 

 placed in a glass covered tray, and were soon observed to produce 

 a quantity of flocculent cottony material, which appearing first as a 

 fringe round the posterior extremity, gradually increased until it 

 extended like a train from one to two inches in length, amidst which 

 eggs continued to be laid. This process went on for several 

 months, during which I kept them under observation, until some 



