PROCEEDINGS OF THE THIRD ENTOMOLOGICAL MEETING 



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1596, by the King of Portugal, on a scientific mission to tlie East Indies. 

 Abu Hanifa also mentions it and recommends its use as a medicinal 

 thing. In 1781 Dr. Kerr in the Philosophical Transactions, Vol. LXX, 

 p. 574, was the first to describe the lac insect. Nine years later in 1790 

 Dr. Eoxburgh in the idsiatic Researches, Vol. II, pp. 360-366, gave a 

 detailed account of the life-history of the lac insect. Ten years later 

 Dr. Buchanan-Hamilton was the first to publish a detailed account of 

 the propagation and cultivation of lac in India, and tluee decades after 

 Dr. Carter in 1861 gave an account of the internal anatomy of the insect 

 and this account was reproduced by Mr. J. E. O'Conor in his Note on 

 Lac Production, Manufacture and Trade. Of late a large amount of 

 literature has appeared, but this relates to lac either grown or collected 

 in the forests. There is very little comprehensive information regarding 

 the industry as pursued in the Plains of India and from what I have 

 seen there are reasons to believe that this aspect of the industry is very 

 widespread in the Plains and provides means of subsistence to thousands, 

 if not millions, of the poor illiterate masses — especially the aborigines 

 who inhabit the outskirts of forests or the interior of districts where 

 the host-plants of the lac insect abound. The information regarding 

 cultivation in the Plains lies scattered in the District Gazetteers or the 

 Revenue Reports which are practically inaccessible to the public. But 

 for all this, the industry is very important to an agricultural coimtry 

 like India, where, I know from personal observations, it forms an import- 

 ant adjunct to agriculture and as such helps the. cultivators in such 

 areas to tide over financial stress at a time when rates are low and cli- 

 matic conditions are against them in, disposing of their produce in the 

 market. That the cultivation is widespread and important is evident 

 from the export figures of shellac from the Port of Calcutta alone. As 

 I have already pointed out in my article on " The Present Condition of 

 Lac Cultivation in the Plains of India " {Agri. Jour. India, Vol. XIII, 

 Part III, July 1918) the exports of shellac from the port of Calcutta 

 only have been as follows during the past twelve years :^- 



