100 



Indies, for the purpose of exterminating a scale insect allied to Icerya 

 purchasi, which had made its appearance upon their orchards of lime 

 trees. We at once entered into correspondence with Mr. H. de O. 

 Hamilton, the attorney in question, asking for specimens of the insect 

 in order to ascertain its relationship to I. purchasi before securing the 

 sending of the Vedalia, as experiments both in this country and New Zea- 

 land have shown us that the latter insect is probably confined strictly to /. 

 purchasi for food. It will feed on no other scale insects which have been 



offered to it, although 

 we have not been able 

 to test it with other 

 species of the same 

 genus for the reason 

 that 7. seychellarum, the 

 only other congeneric 

 species known up to 

 the present time, seems 

 to be confined to cer- 

 tain islands in the In- 

 dian Ocean, and we 

 have never seen living 

 specimens. 



Mr. Hamilton 

 promptly sent us sev- 

 eral species of Coccidae 

 on the twigs, leaves, 

 and fruit of the Lime, 

 among them Chionaspis 

 citri Comst. and Mytil- 

 aspis citricola Pack. 

 The new insect, how- 

 ever, was not found 

 upon the limes in the 

 package, but upon 

 certain curious costate 

 leaves which Dr. Yasey 

 informs us are those of some species of Chrysophyllum^ but whether of 

 the common Star Apple or ot some ornamental species could not be 

 decided from the mildewed specimens received. Later letters from 

 Mr. Hamilton state that it occurs also upon the cocoa and banana 

 trees and other forest trees in the vicinity of the original Chrysophyl- 

 lum. Upon the leaves of the last named tree it was clustered most 

 abundantly upon the under side along the midrib. The leaves were 

 abundantly covered with a smut-fungus*, particularly upon the upper 



* This smut-fungus has been determined by Mr. D. G. Fairchild, of the Division of 

 Vegetable Pathology, as Antennaria pannosa Berkley. 



Fig. li.— Icerya montserratensis : a, newly hatched larva ; 

 greatly eblarged ('original). 



b, egg — 



