216 Transactions.—Zoology. 
With a very high power of the microscope the commencement of the 
test may be observed, which in the next stage envelopes the insect. Here, 
as shown in fig. 175, the outline is still oval, but the edge is slightly crenated ; 
there are now only four hairs at the posterior end and these are short. The 
insect is evidently quite enclosed in the test. There is an indication of the 
abdominal cleft, but it is only a sort of groove, and the abdominal lobes are 
replaced by a sort of vase-shaped organ. It is possible sometimes to mount 
a specimen so that the sight is not wholly impeded by the test, and it is 
then seen that the antennz are short and the legs thick, but I have not 
been able to make out the joints of either satisfactorily. Round the edge 
runs a row of cup-shaped spinnerets, and a number of others, sometimes 
protruding in form of tubes, are scattered over the body. 
Later on, although the insect appears not to have entered any further 
stage, the tests are very frequently found empty. This may be attributed 
to the action of parasitic flies, for the tests commonly enclose either the 
pupa or the pellicles of these, the scale insect having disappeared. The 
tests are white and glassy, and over them are scattered, chiefly round the 
edge, tubular appendices corresponding to the spinnerets on the body of the 
insect. Sometimes these tubes are set so close together that they are 
straight and have the appearance of a fringe, but as a rule they are 
irregularly set and curled in different directions. 
2. Asterochiton aureus, sp. NOV. 
Plate VII., fig. 17. 
I have this species from Melicytus ramiflorus at Auckland. It differs 
from the last in being of a golden or orange colour, the insect in the middle 
being purple. The outline is also more inclined to be circular, the size is 
larger, the test is somewhat thinner and allows the insect to be better seen, 
the groove at the posterior end is deeper, and the rows of spinnerets more 
numerous. I have not observed in this species any protruding tubes. The 
antenne and legs, so far as I have been able to make them out, seem 
to resemble those of A. lecanioides. Fig. 17d. 
I pass now to the description of the Coecidz proper. This group con- 
tains several subdivisions, but, as heretofore, I shall confine myself to those 
which appear to me to be indigenous. The differences between many of 
the subdivisions are not to be detected without the microscope, depending 
as they do upon the number of joints of the antenn;, number of anal hairs, 
number of digitules, ete. As for the species which I have collected here I 
have had a good deal of difficulty in deciding sometimes whether they differ 
or not from European species; and even now I am not, in some cases, 
