204 COCCUS CACTI. 



have been preserved in honey, are, with two drachms of powdered 

 black ebony, one drachm of Virginia snake root, one drachm of 

 lead filings, and twenty grains of fungus sorbi, to be reduced to a 

 very fine powder ; the whole, with two drachms of theriacae of 

 Venice, (and if necessary with a little elder root) are to be formed 

 into an electuary. Professor Christison in his excellent work on 

 Poisons, quotes an account from Rust's Magazine, of four persons 

 who took the powder of this insect from a quack for spasms of the 

 stomach. The principal symptoms were stifling and vomiting ; 

 and two of the people died within twenty-four hours.* The Meloe 

 varialilis, which has been confounded by all the continental writers 

 who have noticed it with the M. maialis of Linn, is said to possess 

 the same acrid properties. It is figured by Dr. Leach in the 1 ] th 

 vol. of the Transactions of the Linnean Society, t. vi. f. 1, 2, and 

 by Donovan under the name of Meloe variegatus. 



COCCUS CACTI, 



Cochineal Insect. 



Pl. XXVII. fig. 2. 



Order Hemiptera, Lin. Cuv. Omoptera. Family 

 Coccid/e, Leach. Gallinsecta, Latr. 



Gen. Char. Antenna: 11-joinled, filiform or setaceous; 

 tarsi with one joint and one nail ; male destitute of a 

 rostrum, with two wings covering the body hori- 

 zontally ; abdomen terminated by two setae ; female 

 apterous, furnished with a rostrum. 



Spec. Char. Male very small, with the antenna: shorter 

 than the body ; body elongated, deep red, terminated 



* Maguzin fur die gesammtc Heilkunde, viii .109. 



