170 ENTOMOLOGY. 



perfect scarlet is obtained from the same insect whose se- 

 cretion, under the name of Lac, is applied to so many 

 useful purposes ; and with the crimson dye of the Cochi- 

 neal insect, all are familiar. This insect, the Coccus 

 Cacti, is a native of South America, and is particularly 

 cultivated in Mexico. When the female, which is alone 

 valuable, has arrived at its perfect state, it fixes itself to 

 thn surface of the leaf, and encloses itself in a white cottony 

 matter which it secretes. When it has deposited all its eggs, 

 it shrivels and dies ; but as its colouring qualities are thus 

 destroyed, those who raise them are careful to kill them 

 before this time, which they do by brushing them off the 

 plants, and applying the fumes of hot vinegar, or throw- 

 ing them into boiling water ; they are then dried and im- 

 ported into Europe. The cultivation of the cochineal 

 insect requires much attention, and the gathering of 

 them also. But the time of those thus occupied is well 

 employed, this insect furnishing the most valuable dye ob- 

 tained from this class of animals. Humboldt tells us, that 

 the quantity annually exported from South America, is 

 there worth upwards of five hundred thousand pounds ster- 

 ling; and it has been said that the Spanish government 

 is yearly more enriched by this article, than by the 

 produce of all its gold mines. The directors of the East 

 India Company offered a reward of six thousand pounds 

 to any one who should introduce it into India. In com- 

 merce, this article is almost always adulterated, different 

 substances being mixed with it, and colored by it ; and Dr 

 Paris, in his Pharmacologia, remarks, that a very consi- 

 derable number of women and children get a support in 

 London, by forming in moulds made for that purpose, 

 particles of dough, and coloring them with cochineal. 



The Lac insect referred to above, another species of 

 Coccus, lives upon a species of Ilhamnus. It is nourish- 

 ed by the tree, and there deposits its eggs, -which it 

 defends by this secretion, which also serves as a habita- 

 tion for the perfect insect, and answers for food to the 

 larva. This lac is formed into cells, finished with much 

 regularity and art. The flies are invited to deposit their 

 eggs on the branches of the tree, by besmearing them 

 with some of the fresh lac steeped in water, which attracts 



