6 
I'lviian Forest Records. 
[ VoL. I. 
Female insect . — By the end of a month the female insect has become 
considerably swollen and enlarged, having 
excreted a certain amount of a resinous scale 
substance (lac) round it. It is then ^-gth of an inch in length. By now 
it will be seen that the antennae, legs and the head (chitinous) outer 
portions of the body have disappeared, having become incorporated 
with the resinous secretion. The eyes have disappeared, and if the resin 
IS dissolved away from the insect it wil be seen to have become a dark- 
red, elliptical, smooth, shining sac, the only appendages visible being 
the three white tufts or hair-like filaments at its obtuser end and the beak 
or proboscis at the elongated end, which is now fully developed. The 
proboscis consists of a fleshy projecton situated beneath th^ insect at 
a short distance from the head. Tliis structure consists of several hairs 
and spines which together form the penetrating organ by which the bark 
is pierced and the tube up through which the sap is sucked into the body. 
The three apertures from which the white tufts proceed and which can now 
be seen to open through the resinous incrustation are situated at the 
thoracic and posterior ends of the insect. The two former appear to 
replace the wings whilst the latter proceeds from the anal aperture. 
The white tufts projecting from these consist of the extremities of the 
tracheae (the air tubes which ramify through the body of an insect and 
form the air-breathing apparatus are termed tracheae) and are covered 
Avith a white powder. 
Thus the increase in size which takes place in the female insect, 
from the locomotive or active walking stage possessed by the yoimg 
larva to the subsequent quiescent motionless stage of hfe, is chiefly 
brought about by an enlargement and elongation of the body between 
the mouth and the parts of the body from which the three white tufts 
project. 
The chief points of interest in the interior of the body are the irregu- 
larly massed bundles, without any apparent order, of the white 
tracheae, many of whose extremities protrude through the three apertures 
(two small thoracic and one large anal) on the surface, as described 
above, and the ovary. This ovary is of immense size, almost filling the 
body and contains the red colouring matter known as the lac-dye of com- 
merce. 
PI. II, fig. 1 d, show's the empty skin of the female insect after the 
larvae have issued from it. 
The scale which covers the female insect at this stage is, when isolated 
from the rest (which is not often the case as they are usually agglomerated 
