412 General Notes. [May, 



beetles, both larva and imago, feed upon the Coccids in all their 

 stages. They never bite through or tear off the scale, but seem 

 to push their heads under, between the bark and the scale. Larvae 

 of the scale-insect are quite abundant on the trunk, and these are 

 sucked by the Coccinellid. Although this is not properly a breed- 

 ing time of the scale, there are considerable numbers of scale 

 larvae wandering about, and I noticed again and again that they 

 frequently mount upon the bodies of the Coccinellids while the 

 latter are feeding and without attracting the attention of the 

 beetle. It even seems to me that they are attracted by the 

 smooth and shining surface of the Hyperaspidius' elytra, as I 

 sometimes saw three or four of the scale larvae together upon 

 the back of a single individual of this extremely small beetle. As 

 several large Coccinellids, Chilocoms bivulnerus, et al., are extreme- 

 ly common in all our groves, and all feed more or less upon 

 Coccids, it does not seem surprising that the scale should spread 

 from tree to tree. Another method of transportation has recently 

 occurred to me. The shrike or butcher bird is very fond of 

 selecting orange thorns as places to store insects. The bird is 

 extremely common, and of course preferably selects orange trees 

 that have Ion . in fact, precisely those that are 



most thickly infested with Long scale. I know of one grove, much 

 infested with scale and where at any time may be collected a double 

 handful of dead or living insects (Orthoptera and common beetles 

 like Phanaeus) from the orange thorns upon which they have 

 been impaled. The thorns on infected branches are always thick- 

 ly coated with long scale, and in impaling a hard shelled insect 

 like Phanaeus many scales are torn off, and both scales and their 

 eggs adhere to the insect. The shrike sometimes transfers the 

 insects it has impaled upon one tree to a thorn upon another tree, 

 or after making a meal of its prey which it takes off of a thorn, 

 the bird flies off and wipes its bill on the next tree. In this way 

 as well as upon its feet, the bird must spread scales from tree to 

 tree.—//. G. Hubbard, Crescent City, Fta., Dec. 12, 1S81. 

 ANTHROPOLOGY. 1 



Charney on the Age of Palanque.— I am strongly inclined 

 to agree in the main, though not entirely with Charney 's opinion 

 in reference to the age of Palanque as expressed in the October 

 number, 188 1, of the North American Review. But the inscrip- 

 tion on the tablet presents a serious difficulty to his supposition 

 that it was of Toltec origin, unless Toltec and Maya be the same. 



This is undoubtedly Maya, as it is not difficult to show that at 

 least fifty of the characters are the symbols or hieroglyphs of 

 Maya days and months with accompanying numerals. 'I he large 

 initial at the upper left-hand corner is probably the hieroglyph pi 

 the word Pacumchac, the name of a great religious festival held in 

 > Edited by Professor Oris T. Mason, 1305 Q. street, N. W., Washington, D. C. 



