64 INSECT-WHITE-WAX OF CHINA. 



1853. mass or shell, which is the full grown body of the female insect, 

 varies in diameter from & to -^ of an inch. It has a linear 

 opening on one side indicating the part at which it was attached 

 to the branch, and is besides frequently perforated with one or 

 more small holes. As the wood-cut shows, it occurs as it were, 

 seated in the wax encrusting the branch, like a minute gall or 

 small round sessile berry. Besides these large females, the wax 

 contains imbedded in its under surface an abundance of minute 

 insects in a younger state, which are probably the real pro- 

 ducers of the wax. In form they are not unlike little oval 

 wood-lice (Onisci). The crude wax itself forms around the 

 branch a white, soft fibrous, velvety coating of from one to 

 two-tenths of an inch in thickness. When scraped off, as in 

 a specimen which I have examined, it occurs in light, flat, 

 curled or rounded, irregular pieces, the larger of which are 

 about half an inch in greatest length. Having observed that 

 its microscopic characters presented features of interest, I sent 

 a specimen to Mr. Quekett, the result of whose investigations 

 were afterwards published. 



So far as I can ascertain, no European has yet had the oppor- 

 tunity of examining the living wax insect in its native locali- 

 ties ; I therefore insert the following account of its culture, as 

 taken chiefly from Chinese authors, 1 at the same time making 

 no attempt to reconcile it with the well known habits of other 

 species of Coccus* 



1 Quoted by Du Halde in his Description de la Chine, ed. 1735, tome iii., 

 p. 495 ; by M. Stanislas Julien in the Comptes Rendus, 13 April, 1840 

 (pp. 518625) ; also by Dr. D. J. Macgowan, in a paper On the Uses of the 

 Stiilingia sebifera or Tallow Tree, with a notice of the Pe"-la or insect-wax of 

 China, contained in the Journal of the Agricultural and Horticultural 

 Society of India. Calcutta, 1850, vol. vii., part i. p. 164. Through the 

 kind assistance of Mrs. Lockhart, I have been enabled to compare with these 

 one of the accounts in the original Chinese contained in the herbal called 

 Pun-isaou-lcang-muh. 



8 It may be interesting to those unacquainted with the habits of Coccus to 

 read the following lines respecting a well-known species, C. Kermes : 



" In their youth, the females resemble little white wood-lice, which would 

 have but six feet. They run upon the leaves, and afterwards fix upon the 

 stems and branches of trees and shrubs, where they pass many months in 

 succession. It is then that they assume the figure of a gall or excrescence." 

 CUVIER'S Animal Kingdom. London, 1832, vol. xv., p. 286. 



