440 ARTICULATES : INSECTS. 



males, and in their turn bring forth living young ; and in 

 this way brood after brood is produced, even to the four- 

 teenth generation, in a single season, and this without 

 the appearance of a single male. But the last brood in 

 autumn contains both males and females, which at length 

 have wings, pair, stock the plants with eggs, and then per- 

 ish. Reaumur has proved that a single aphis in five gen- 

 erations may become the progenitor of about six thousand 

 millions of descendants. Wherever plant-lice abound, 

 ants collect to feed upon the honey-like fluid produced by 

 them ; and the most friendly relations exist between these 

 two kinds of insects. The ants even caress the plant-lice 

 with their antennae, apparently soliciting them to give 

 out the sweet fluid, and the plant-lice yield to these solici- 

 tations ; and a single aphis has been known to give in 

 succession a drop to each of a number of ants waiting to 

 receive it ! In return, the ants take the kindest care of 

 the plant-lice, warding off or removing anything that 

 might be injurious to them. Plant-lice are kept in check 

 by the beetles called Lady-bugs, already described. 



The Genus Eriosoma contains Downy Plant-lice, or 

 those which have a sort of woolly or cottony covering. 



COCCID^E, Fallen, OR BARK-LICE FAMILY. This Fam- 

 ily comprises small insects, which, in the form of oval, 

 rounded, or other shaped scales or shields, cover the bark 

 of the stems and branches, and, in some cases, the leaves 

 and roots of plants. The males alone are winged, and 

 pass through the usual changes, while the females in- 

 crease in size, always keeping the scale-like form. The 

 Genus Coccus is the principal one. 



C. ilicis, Linn., lives on a low shrub of the Levant, and 

 is the insect which supplied the famous dye KOKKOS of the 

 Greeks, Coccus of the Romans, Kermes of the Arabs, 

 Cocchi of the Italians, and Alkermes of the Persians. 

 The Scarlet Grain, of Poland, C. polonicus, Linn., was 



