169 
Oak is given, and there is a figure of a branch of the oak with the 
red berry-like “ Kermes-schildliusen.” According to Hayne, the 
insect nature of the berries was demonstrated as early as 1530, but 
later 7 was disbelieved and their vegetable origin was asserted. 
He adds that the insect is now known as Coceus Ilicis of Fabricius 
or bois quercus cocciferae of Nees v. Essenbeck. 
Eastlake, in his “ Materials for a history of Oil Painting,” 
Vol. £., 1847, pp. 115, 116, gives some interesting information on 
the subject. “Chaucer in the ‘Nonnes Preestes ‘Tale’ alludes to 
it [grain dye] thus 
“ He looketh as a sparhauk with his eyen 
Him needeth not his colour for to dien 
With brazil, ne with grain of Portingale.” 
* The insect called Kermes by the Moors furnished the colour 
and name of crimson eo cremesius); sometimes called 
grain from the prepared ma 
“ The grain of Portugal was celebrated from the time of Pliny 
to that. s = heuer 
um . circa Emeritan Lusitaniae in maxima laude est.— 
shu ix. c. 65.” 
“The word Vermiculus, the older form of vermillion, also refers 
to this insect in the earlier treatises, 
Loudon i in ‘i III, of his “ Arboretum et Fruticetum Britanni- 
Kermes Oak. 
«In its natural state,” he records, “the kermes is of a shinin 
appearance and of the colour of a plum with whitish bloom. In 
the state in which it is brought into the market it appears of a dull 
reddish-brown, which is not of course = noi of good Chermes 
but is imparted to it by steeping it in v 
He adds further that “ The cnchanin aah produce the Kermes 
immediately steep them in vinegar, and ht expose them to the 
action of heat sufficient to destroy any remaining vitality in the 
young : this process considerably alters a colour of the insect, and 
gives it that red hue for which it has been so long celebrated.” 
uercus coccifera, according to Loudon, p. 1908, was cultivated 
in Britain previously to 1683, and “is well known as producing the 
es or scarlet grain, of commerce.’ 
rther a to * grain’ as a colour occurs in apneic: 
£ % will-discharge it im: 244.08:) $34". your ae a -grain beard . 
— Bottom, % “ Midsummer Night’s Dream” , 97. 
African Bass or Piassava (Raphia vinifera, Beauv.). —In the Kew 
Bulletin for 1891, pp. 1-5, is recorded the history of West African 
Bass fibre from the Colony of Lagos, and in the same publication © 
in the year following, pp. 299-300, appeared a — note | rahe 4 
shipment of this fibre from m Appam, a port on the Gold 
Several kinds of the fibre are now regularly exported etn 
various ports in West Africa and quite recently some 3000 bundles 
of the fibre were submitted to waar in Liverpool. 
In the Monthly Consular and Trade Reports of the United 
States of — No, 352, 1910, Pp. 213, the following interesting 
