248 [^Vrih 



the Arabs, Cremesi or Cocchi of the Italians, and Alhermes of the 

 Persians. Burmeister unites into one genus this and many others 

 having the body of the female greatly swollen without any trace of 

 limbs or articulations ; and those which have the body flat, slender, 

 and shield-like (Z. Jiesperidum, &c.), with the limbs, antennae and anal 

 appendages distinct ; the latter may retain the name of Lecanium, G. 

 ilicis that of Coccus, and G. cacti that of Pseudo-coccus. "" This counsel 

 has not been attended to, for when ilicis was separated from Lecanium 

 it was made into two species, which were not referred to Goccus but 

 to Kermes ; hesperidum is still associated with its former companions 

 as Lecanium, and cacti stands as the representative of Goccus, which 

 nominates the family, all, as I think with "Westwood, in contravention 

 of the intention of the founder of the genus Goccus. 



As to GJiermes, under which name Linne placed a well-defined 

 group of Homoptera (Faun. Suec, 1761), but did not until afterwards 

 characterize the genus (Syst. Nat., 17G7), Geo&oy, in the interval 

 (Hist. abr. des Insectes, 1764), on the ground that Linne had mis- 

 appropriated the old name Ghermes, substituted Psijlla for it, and his 

 idea has been generally adopted ; Linne, however, adhered to Ghermes 

 and cited Fsylla as a synonym ; Fabricius, Zetterstedt, and, later, 

 Thomson, follow Linne in using Ghermes instead of Psylla. Ghermes 

 is now made to do duty for a genus of GoccidcB, and still more curiously 

 Buck ton (Brit. Aphides, iv, 22) follows Passerini, Kaltenbach, 

 Koch, &c., in employing the name for a genus of Aphides. This 

 anomalous state of things Maskell (Trans. N. Zeal. Instit., xvii, 19, 

 1885) proposes to rectify by using the name Kermaphis for the 

 Aphidians, leaving Ghermes for the Coccids. 



With respect to the reputed species of Lecanium, some scales 

 (^ & $ found on different trees are so extremely similar to each other 

 that I long entertained an unverified suspicion that they really be- 

 longed to but one polyphagous species only, and I have just learned 

 that Foerster in his overlooked article "Ueber Schildlause " in the 

 " Yerhandl. des naturhist. Vereins der preuss. Eheinlande," 1851, 

 viii, p. 551, united L. coryli, Lin., tilice, Lin., hetulce, Lin., and carpini, 

 Lin., as one species under the name L. vagahimdum. This deserves 

 further investigation in the light of recent microscopic research ; at 

 present I am not in a position to say anything decisive. The same 

 kind of enquiry may advantageously be made with other reputed 

 species, and the removal of gravid females from one kind of tree and 

 fixing them on another might also be tried and the result watched. 



