274 THE FAUNA OF BRITISH EAST AFRICA part hi 



There were several similar clusters close by, and when Mr. 

 Watson came up I pointed one out to him and asked him if 

 he had determined to what genus it belonged. He said he 

 had not done so, but that he had seen it before, growing in 

 these woods. He attempted to pick it, and was as surprised as 

 I had been at the result. 



The arrangement of the colony, with the green bud-like 

 form at the top of the stem, and the pink flower-like insects 

 below, looked so much like an inflorescence that it deceived 

 both of us, although Mr. Watson is an enthusiastic botanist. 



Whether the insects can resume this arrangement on the 

 stem if they are once disturbed I cannot tell. Though we sat 

 and watched beside them for an hour, they made no attempt to 

 return to the stem. The insects were very sluggish, and simply 

 clung to the leaves on which they first alighted. As a rule the 

 members of this genus can fly well, but these seemed only able 

 to hop for a few inches ^t a time, and would not move if they 

 could help it. It may be that the insects were only rendered 

 sluggish by the cold and rain ; but it appears not unlikely that 

 the members of this species have very limited powers of flight, 

 and secured protection from birds by this ingenious mimicry of 

 a cluster of flowers. The colony resembled very closely some 

 species of Tinncea, a genus which grows in this district ; and 

 Dr. Rudolf Schlechter tells me that it is even more like a 

 Transvaal plant, which he names Sesamopteris pentapJiylla, DC. 



At the time I was much puzzled, for mistaking the lichen- 

 like form for the larva of a beetle, I thought the pseudo- 

 inflorescence was formed by three distinct species. My 

 colleague Mr. C. J. Gahan, however, identified the insects as 

 members of the hemipterous genus Plata, and on examining 

 specimens in the British Museum we found that the larva 

 belonged to the same genus.^ 



The arrangement is therefore intelligible : a female has 



^ The mimicry of the larva is now well known, as a colony of the larvae of an allied 

 species [Flata limbata) has been placed by Sir William Flower in the mimicry cases in 

 the Natural History Museum, to illustrate their resemblance to lichens. Mr. W. F. 

 Kirby has kindly called my attention to a translation of a paper by M. C. Piepers, ' ' On 

 the Habits of East Indian Insects, especially Lepidoptera," in his Handbook to the Order 

 Lepidoptera (Nat. Libr. vol i. , 1894, pp. Ixii.-Lxxiv. ) In this Piepers describes how two 

 rings of the orange butterfly Callidryas scylla, L. , surrounded five white species of the 

 genus Pieris, giving rise to a group, which was at first mistaken for an orange-coloured 

 flower. 



