of various British hisects. 207 



then become stationary, and by degrees an elongated double pellicle, 

 of a thin texture and white colour, is added to the extremity of the 

 body in some way or other, I suppose by secretion. This pellicle 

 becomes a true cocoon for the pupa, which is detached from it 

 within, just as in the Muscideous pupae the skin of the larva becomes 

 the cocoon, inclosing a distinctly formed incomplete pupa within. 

 In the specimens which I have examined, the pellicle (with the cast 

 external skin of the larva attached) alone remained, the pupa and 

 imago not being perceivable. Hence I have no doubt that the males 

 had simultaneously arrived at the perfect state previously to the 

 leaves being plucked, made their escape, impregnated the females, 

 and died. Here indeed is clearly no continuous production of the indi- 

 viduals as asserted by Bouche in his account of the Coccus Bromelia; ; 

 I should, on the contrary, say only an annual one. The female larva; 

 when full grown become stationary for the remainder of their exist- 

 ence, and cover themselves, as I imagine by secretion, with a thin 

 scale or pellicle of a circular form, much larger than the male pel- 

 licle ; beneath this pellicle the fleshy-bodied female is easily disco- 

 vered, but dead, having in most cases several minute eggs or already 

 hatched young ones beneath her body. 



The species which infests the fruit continues active all its life ; at 

 all events this is the case with the females ; the males I have not 

 discovered ; and at the time when this observation was made the 

 females might be perceived in the act of depositing their eggs in the 

 midst of the cottony mass which gives so unsightly an appearance 

 to the fruit. The form of the body of this female is quite unlike 

 that of the other species, being provided with numerous lateral rays 

 and covered with a downy kind of powder. The insects which are 

 at the crown of the fruit are of a smaller size than those at the bottom, 

 and not occupied in depositing eggs. Hence we may suppose that 

 the production is in this species continuous, but in as much as the 

 body of the females and young is never covered with the scale-like 

 secretion observable in the others, the application of remedies will 

 be less difiicult and more sure of success than in the latter; indeed 

 it seems evident that the most effectual period for attacking the pine- 

 leaf Coccus must be that when the young and tender larvse are first 

 bursting forth from beneath the scale of the female. M. de Wael 

 tells me that an infusion of coUoquint is very efficient in destroying 

 these insects applied with a brush or syringe. 



