Dec. 8, 1887] 



NATURE 



125 



It would have been more politic had Mr. Howorth 

 contented himself with local deluges ; but no, his destroy- 

 ing waves must pass over the whole earth. What is to 

 generate these destructive waves, what multiplication 

 of a Kra'catab catastrophe is needed, how many cubic 

 miles of mountain summit must fall into the sea, or of 

 ocean bed leap up into the air, he forbears to tell us. 

 Here, after a laborious scrutiny of facts, the reader is 

 refreshed by a use of the imagination. 



We leave a host of minor difficulties unnoticed for 

 want of space, such as the occurrence of erratic blocks 

 in positions of unstable equilibrium, the relation of drifts, 

 supposed cataclysmal by the author, to the valleys in 

 which they occur, the escape of apterous birds like the 

 moa and the dodo, and the like. We must part from the 

 book by saying that it exhibits great industry in the 

 collection of materials — so that it will long be valuable as 

 a work of reference — with a curious want of mental 

 perspective, and a misapplied ingenuity of reasoning. 



NEW ZEALAND SCALE INSECTS. 



An Account of New Zealand Scale Insects. By W. M. 

 Maskell, F.R.M.S. (Wellington : Geo. Didsbury, 1887.) 



''T^HIS book shows that the valuable work which is 

 *- being done in South Australia by Mr. Frazer 

 Crawford, Inspector under the Vine-Protection Act, is 

 being done on a still greater scale in New Zealand. It 

 affords an example of the great service which may be 

 rendered by plain and sound publications on the subject of 

 injurious insect attacks in the colonies. In the mother 

 country the works which have been prepared for the 

 Agricultural Department of the Privy Council by Mr. 

 Whitehead, and Miss E. A. Ormerod's constant valuable 

 publications on economic entomology, show what can be 

 achieved in this field. 



It is eminently satisfactory to find such an important 

 subject taken up in New Zealand by an observer so well 

 known as Mr. Maskell. The work extends to 116 pages, 

 and includes exhaustive information on the Coccididae 

 affecting the crops of the island. The life-history of the 

 Coccididae (which are divided by the author as follows : 

 I. Diaspidinae ; II. Lecanidinae ; III. Hemicoccidinae ; 

 IV, Coccidinas) is given in all its stages, a whole 

 chapter being devoted to it, with descriptions of the 

 male and female perfect insects in detail, and another to 

 the natural checks to their increase, and parasites, &c. 



The remedies against Coccididae are fully treated of in 

 Chapter V. The author gives a list of washes, of which 

 he says ; " Some of the substances here given are 

 manifestly unsuitable for general use on account of their 

 expense, at any rate in the open air ; yet it is well to 

 include them, as they are all suggested in some work 

 or other, or in the replies of gardeners and fruit-growers 

 to Parliamentary inquiries, and the objections to them 

 ought to be known." 



Chapter VI. is devoted to "A Catalogue of Insects" — 

 that is, of the Coccididas — and " A Diagnosis of Species," 

 and will be found to be of great service to all students of 

 entomology. Particular attention is paid to the cottony- 

 cushion scale, the Icerya purchasi, whose ravages in 

 South Africa have been so ably treated of in the 



pamphlet lately published by the Consulting Entomo- 

 logist of the Royal Agricultural Society of England, also 

 by the State Inspector of the Fruit Pests of California, 

 and more recently by Prof. Riley, the well-known Entomo- 

 logist of the Department of Agriculture of the United 

 States. " Tree-growers should especially beware of this 

 insect, and the best plan to adopt would be to burn at 

 once any tree found infested with it." 



This chapter, which occupies almost two-thirds of the 

 book, is succeeded by an index of plants and the Coc- 

 cididae attacking them, with the useful reminder that in 

 hot-houses and green-houses all sorts of plants are liable 

 to attack. 



The work also contains twenty-three well-drawn 

 plates, which convey a good idea of the Coccididae to 

 those who have not the opportunity of studying them. 

 Plates I., II., and III. deal with anatomical points or 

 structural details ; Plates IV. to XX. give a large selec- 

 tion of insects, with specimens of the various trees and 

 plants they infest ; Plate XXI. is especially valuable as 

 giving the male insects Ccelostoma zcelandicum and 

 C. wairoense, the antenna of the former and the 

 head of the latter being especially well marked. 

 Plate XXII. gives the honey-dew and resulting fungi, 

 and Plate XXIII. parasites of Coccididae. "Fig. i, a, 

 pupa of Hymenopterous parasites ; b, the same pupa 

 under the waxy test of Ctenochiton perforatus; c, imago. 

 Fig. 2, a, brown and yellow fungi on Ctenochiton viridis ; 

 b, upper side of brown fungus ; c, under side of the same, 

 with attached fungoid sheet ; d, Ctenochiton viridis (test 

 removed), filled with yellow fungus, and with globular 

 mass of the same above it." 



From the above brief sketch of the contents of Mr. 

 Maskell's book it will be seen that it is a welcome addi- 

 tion to entomological literature. It is written in plain 

 and forcible language, and there is no padding or beating 

 about the bush for the reviewer to find fault with. There 

 is an excellent tabulated explanation of terms used, and 

 students will be much pleased with the author's classifi- 

 cation, or rather division or arrangement, of the Cocci- 

 didae, based upon a plan most useful for economic 

 entomology : — 



" Neglecting entomological distinctions, we may divide 

 the Coccididae roughly into 



" (a) Insects attacking deciduous plants ; 

 " \b) Insects attacking evergreen plants ; 



or again : 



" if) Insects living usually on the bark ; 

 " {d) Insects living usually on the leaves ; 

 " \e) Insects living on both bark and leaves ; 



or lastly : 



*' (/) Insects covered with hard shields or * scales' ; 

 "(;f) Insects covered with cotton ; 

 *' Qi) Insects naked." 



Among other salient points the importance of destroy- 

 ing the eggs is frequently urged upon those who wish to 

 extirpate coccids, and attention is wisely drawn to the 

 fact that " it is a fallacy to imagine that rule-of-thurab 

 methods, not founded upon any knowledge of the nature, 

 habits, and life-history of the insects, are likely to be 

 really efficacious." 



We agree with the author that an increase in works on 



