343 



OBSERVATIONS ON SC.AXE-INSECTS (COCCIDAE)— III. 



By Robert Newstead, F.R.S., 

 The School of Tropical Medicine, The University, Liver'pool. 



(Plates VI and VII). 



Piatysaissetia carpenter!, sp. nov. 



Female, adult. More or less circular or faintly pentagonal ; low convex ; pseudo- 

 margin strongly rounded, giving the insect a markedly " crustliform " (Green) 

 appearance ; margin very thin and shallow ; anterior stigmatic clefts well defined. 

 Dorsum with a slightly subcentral depression, from which there arise strong radial 

 striae extending to the pseudo-margin. Anal cleft fused. Anal lobes in the sub- 

 central depression, so that they appear almost in the middle of the back. Colour 

 of dorsum brownish black, with minute reddish-buff glandular spots. Venter coffee- 

 brown. Detached scurfy particles of a somewhat glassy secretion within the pseudo- 

 margin, and six larger particles of similar material, each resting upon a minute 

 tubercle, arranged in a parallelogram near the central depression. Derm cells 

 closely packed together, very irregular in shape, many being markedly attenuated 

 at one extremity ; these are divided into more or less definite radial bands corres- 

 ponding to the spaces between external striae ; in the central area of the dorsum 

 they are almost obscured by the dense chitin, so that only the minute central 

 pores are traceable ; in this same area are a number of larger and clearer pores 

 varying considerably in size, the larger ones radiating from the anal lobes. 



Length, 101-0"5 mm. 



Female test, second stage. Completely covering the whole of the upper parts of 

 the body ; opaque, glassy white, and finely vesicular ; divided into median, sub- 

 median and marginal rows of relatively large, imbricated plates ; extreme margin 

 with portions of a fringe of fibrous matter of a similar nature to that which forms the 

 test proper. 



Length, 2-2 mm. ; width, l'7mm. 



The above diagnosis was drawn from the ventral surface of a single specimen which 

 had fixed itself in one of the large stigmatic clefts of the type female. 



Female, second stage. Elongate-ovate ; margin faintly wavy. Legs and antennae 

 highly developed ; the latter (fig. 1, a) of six segments ; 3rd very long, equalling 

 the length of the last three together ; formula : 3, 2 (4, 6), 1, 5. Legs longer than the 

 antermae ; tarsi shorter than the tibiae ; femora rather incrassate. Stigmatic clefts 

 obsolete. Stigmatic spines three, laterals with the tips rounded, nearly half the 

 length of the median one ; the latter also bluntly pointed. Marginal spines acute, 

 of about the same length as the lateral stigmatic spines, but broader at the base ; 

 they are placed rather closely together ; those at the angles of the anal cleft about 

 three times the length of the others. Glands of five different types : (1) small, 

 faintly 8-shaped or ovoid, with a faint central bilateral constriction ; these occur 

 in advance of the marginal spines and extend over the whole of the venter in large 

 (C357) c 



