OCCASIONAL NOTES. 
ee 
COCO=NCH. BEE PERS: 
Mr. HALE of Tampin sends the following notes about the 
coco-nut beetles, which seem worth recording :—“ The natives 
here (Tampin ) have the following names for this insect in the 
larval stage—Lembetah and Kelematah. The latter means 
that which tickles the eye (sight being understood), and the 
former is probably derived from it.’ Kelemata, originally 
Géle mata, may, he thinks, be derived in the following way :— 
“ Malay women are generally slightly hysterical, and seeing a 
lump of these larve wriggling about in a vessel would make a 
Malay woman squirm (I can find no better word ) and would 
give her a feeling of being tickled which she would so ex- 
press. The large millipede | have known to cause the same 
sensation to Malay men who are particularly nervous.” 
This suggestion seems quite a possible one for the derivation. 
One may compare FORBES’S account of his throwing a woman 
into a state of /atah, by flicking a caterpillar upon her, and I 
have known a syce unable to look at a death’s head caterpillar 
which I was carrying without violent shuddering and horror. 
_ Mr. HALE adds:—‘‘ The larve are very much relished by 
Malays, and | myself ate several of them and found them 
particularly sweet and nice, having a flavour like a fried filbert. 
The way to cook them is to put them alive into a pan over a 
slow fire and fry them until they are crisp. In the process of 
cooking they exude a quantity of aclear sweet nutty-flavoured 
oil (roo larve will yield about half a pint). This is believed by 
Malay women to be a most excellent hair-oil, and is much used 
by them for that purpose to encourage the growth of girls’ 
hair. The perfect insect is called Kumbang Fenti, Kumbang 
Kalapa and Buang, but all of these names are applied indif- 
ferently to other large beetles.” 
