270 [May > 



THE SPREADING OF ORTHEZIA INS1GNIS IN ENGLAND. 

 BY J. W. DOUGLAS, F.E.S. 



In this Magazine, vol. xxiv, p. 169, I described and figured both 

 sexes of this curious and elegant Coccid from specimens found in the 

 Economic House in the Eoyal Gardens, Kew, by Mr. E. T. Browne, 

 in August, 1887. It was first seen there on plants of a species of 

 Strobilanthes from China, but it afterwards appeared on other foreign 

 plants. There was no information of any injury it had done to them. 



In January, 1888, I received from Mr. J. Irwin Lynch, Curator 

 of the Botanic Gardens at Cambridge, several specimens of the female 

 which had been taken from a plant of Eranthemum nervosum, which, 

 like Strobilanthes, belongs to the Natural Order Acanthacece. It was 

 somewhat numerous, and Mr. Lynch informed me that he had seen 

 the insects on other Acanthacece, but not on plants of any other Order. 

 The insects, he says, no doubt came to Cambridge from Kew, but not 

 on LEranthemum, and he adds that " it does about as much harm as the 

 mealy bug." 



Now, I have just received some examples of the female from a 

 garden at Norwich, where it is reported they are breeding rapidly, 

 and doing considerable damage to plants of Ooleus (Labiates). There 

 can be no doubt that these insects, most probably in the egg-state and 

 unobserved, are conveyed with plants from place to place, and the 

 advent in other quarters of this " Heathen Chinee " may be expected, 

 but not made known soon, for plant cultivators are usually reticent 

 about the acquisition or possession of such creatures. 



Thus this race of white-coated invaders of England, though at 

 first but a small detachment of involuntary migrants from the Celestial 

 Empire, makes progress through the land, vires acquirit eundo, like 

 other previous settlers accommodating itself to the food and circum- 

 stances it meets with, and prospering and multiplying, so that it may 

 be with the progeny 



" Better fifty years of Europe than a cycle of Cathay." 



No doubt gardeners will do their best to destroy these insects, 

 but they will probably not entirely succeed, for, like other Coccids, 

 they are so prolific, that ova at least will survive, and the females 

 produced from them will again decorate the plants with their delicate 

 confection-like forms ; moreover, if not horticulturally favoured, they 

 will be artificially protected creatures, defended from the English 

 climate (or " weather," as it was termed by the American who said we 

 had no climate'), as well as from the parasites and other enemies that 

 would have afflicted them in their native country. 



8, Beaufort Gardens, Lcwisharn : 

 February 8th, 1889. 



