A NEW WAX-SCALE FROM WEST AFRICA. 127 



September passed and no moths appeared, I saw I must wait 

 through the winter. They are coming out as I write (April 6th). 

 The first emerged on April 2nd. Some have beautiful rose- 

 coloured wing-fringes, but the tint quickly fades after death. I 

 have always found T. gracilis to be comparatively scarce, and 

 yet the caterpillars are evidently plentiful enough among the 

 unopened flowers of meadow-sweet. 



All the species I have referred to were kept from the first in 

 the open air. 



Chester : April 6th, 1899. 



A NEW WAX-SCALE FROM WEST AFRICA. 

 By T. D. A. Cockerell, N. M. Agr. Exp. Sta. 



Ceroplastes egbarum, n. sp. 



Waxy female scales often crowded on the twigs, two or more 

 coalescing; about 11 mm. long, 10 broad, and 6 high, the wax 

 extremely thick, not at all divided into plates, snow-white, here and 

 there with a suffused pinkish stain. 



? . Denuded of wax 5|-7 mm. long, 4 broad, 2^-3 high, very 

 dark, with a dorsal hump but no lateral humps ; aual horn a mere 

 mammiform prominence. Boiled in caustic soda, the denuded females 

 give a purple colour, which on dilution with water appears piuk, and 

 soon forms a flocculent pink precipitate. On adding nitric acid a 

 flocculent white precipitate appears, but the pink precipitate is not 

 altered. Skin after boiling remains yellowish brown, chitinous, with 

 scattered minute gland-dots. Stigmatic areas with numerous crowded 

 gland-spots, and many short and rather thick simple spines, but no 

 capitate spines. Legs dark brown, the parts measuring thus in li : 

 Coxa, 120 ; femur with trochanter, 180 ; tibia, 128 ; tarsus with claw, 

 96 to 114. Tarsal digitules 60 li, slender, with a small knob. Claw 

 digitules with very large rouud knobs, extending about 15 fx beyond 

 tip of claw. Antenna? apparently only 6-segmented, but the segmenta- 

 tion towards the end very obscure. The segments measure in u : 

 (1.) 45 ; (2.) 60-69 ; (3.) 66-78 ; (4.) 51 ; (5.) 69 ; (6.) 72. Segment 

 5 has a deep notch which makes it look as if divided into two. 



Young larva? under female about 430 li long and 230 broad, tinged 

 with a warm reddish colour. Male. Scales small, elongate, and glassy. 



Hob. On Mimosa, near Abeokuta, the great city of the 

 Egbas, W. Africa ; collected by Dr. H. Strachan. 



This is a fine wax-producing species, fully equal in this 

 respect to the C. ceriferus, which produces the Indian white wax. 

 On superficial examination it would be taken for G. ceriferus, but 

 it differs in the dorsal hump of the female, and in the proportions 

 of the antennal segments, 2 and 3 being subequal, whereas in 

 ceriferus 3 is very much longer than 2. 



Mesilla Park, New Mexico, U.S.A. : April 5th, 1899. 



