
HEMIPTERA. 
upper side, and the two together form a pretty large cavity. When 
the mother dies, which is not long in happening, her abdomen 
dries up, her skin becomes horny, and forms a sort of shell. It 
is in this membranous cradle that the larvee of the cochineal insect 
are born. The cochineal insect in its wild state lives in the 
woods. But it can without difficulty be reared artificially. 
Every one knows that the little insect called the cochineal 
furnishes, when its body has been dried and reduced to powder, a 
colouring matter of a beautiful red, peculiar to itself. This 
circumstance has saved the cochineal from the persecution 
to which so many other kinds of insects have been devoted 
by the hand of man. In hot climates, in which the cochineal 
insect delights, it has been preserved, and is cultivated as an 
article of commerce. ‘This-is how the cochineal is reared in 
Mexico :—An open piece of land is chosen, protected against the 
west wind, and of about one or two acres in extent. This is sur~ 
rounded with a hedge of reeds, planted in lines, distant from each 
other about a yard, with cuttings of cactus at most about two feet 
apart. The cactus garden made, the next thing is to establish in 
it cochineals. With this object in view they are sought in the 
woods, or else the females of the cochineal insect which are gravid 
are taken off plants which have been sheltered during the winter, 
and placed in dozens, in nests made of cocoa-nut fibres, or in little 
plaited baskets made of the leaves of the dwarf palm, and hung 
on the prickles of the cactus. These are very soon covered 
with young larve. The only thing now required to be done is 
to shelter them from wind and rain. 
The larve are changed into perfect insects, which take 
up their abode permanently on the branches of the cacti, as 
Fig. 93 represents. The Mexicans gather them as soon as they 
have reached the perfect state. The harvest cannot be difficult, 
considering the immobility of these little creatures. When col- 
lected, the cochineals are shut up in wooden boxes, and sent to 
Europe, to be used in dyeing. 
Such is the method, very simple, as we see, of rearing the cochi- 
neal, a method which has been followed for centuries in Mexico. 
Towards the end of the year 1700, a Frenchman named Thierry 
de Menouville, formed the project of taking this precious insect away 

