THE COFFEE BUG. 57 



which branches off from its base, and skirts along the 

 inner margin ; behind the wings is attached a pair of 

 minute halteres of peculiar form. The possession of wings 

 would appear to be the cause why the full-grown male is 

 more rarely seen on the coffee bushes than the female. 

 The female, like the male, attaches herself to the 

 surface of the plant, the place selected being usually 

 the young shoots ; but she is also to be met with on 

 the margins of the undersides of the leaves (on the 

 upper surface neither the male nor the female ever 

 attach themselves), but unlike the male, which derives 

 no nourishment from the juices of the tree (the mouth 

 being obsolete in the perfect state), she punctures the 

 cuticle with a proboscis (a very short three-jointed 

 promuscis) springing, as it were, from the breast, but 

 capable of being greatly porrected, and inserted in the 

 cuticle of the plant, and through this she abstracts her 

 nutriment. In the early pupa state the female i& easily 

 distinguishable from the male by being more elliptical 

 and much more convex. As she increases in size the 

 skin distends and she becomes more smooth and dry, 

 the rings of the body become effaced, and losing 

 entirely the form of an insect, she presents for some 

 time a yellowish pustular shape, but ultimately assumes 

 a roundish conical form, of a dark-brown colour.* 



* There are many other species of the Coccus tribe in Ceylon, 

 some (Pseudococcus) never appearing as a scale, the female wrapping 

 herself up in a white cottony exudation. Many species nearly allied to 

 the true Coccus infest common plants about gardens, such as the 

 Nerium Oleander, Plumeria, Acuminata 1 , and others with milky juices. 

 Another subgenus (Ceroplastes), the female of which produces a pro- 

 tecting waxy material, infests the Qendurassa Vulgaris, the Fureraea 

 Gigantea, the Jak Tree, Mango, and other common trees. 



