As a rule Coccids are injurious to vegetation, especially in warm and temperate regions. They have been reported from all parts of the world-from "China to Peru "-and perhaps Australia furnishes a greater number than any other country yet known. In cold climates they only occur in hot houses and green-houses, therefore gardeners are often familiar with them. As there is scarcely a eucalypt in Victoria free from Coccids, the student of the family has unlimited scope for observation. Of course there are such insects as Pseudococcus casuarina, Maskell, which appear to have a very restricted range, the one named being, so far as I know, only recorded from Myrniong. In 1891 I furnished specimens of this insect to Mr. Maskell, who named it, and included it in his paper of 1892, N.Z. Trans. It was plentiful in 1891, yet since then I have been unable to find any trace of it. In the specimens observed (perhaps several score), no sign of parasitism was discovered. Can anyone suggest why certain insects appear in unusually large numbers after an almost entire absence of them for several years; or why others disappear equally suddenly. It is all very well to say "natural conditions" were favourable or unfavourable (?) But what conditions could be unfavourable to insects such as Pseudococcus casuarina, where no parasitical enemies are known to exist. The Coccids of Victoria present many such interesting and peculiar phases well worthy of consideration. There are already many Coccids in this colony imported from other lands, and as they are so easily brought on trees or plants-even on sawn or hewn timber-it is not to be wondered at. In these days of rapid communication many Coccids are thus spread over the world, and it is unfortunately too often the case that insects thus introduced find more suitable quarters in their new home, and in the absence of their natural enemies often become serious pests. For instance-"The Cotton Cushion Scale" (Icerya purchasi Mask.), which was accidentally introduced into North America some years ago, threatened the extinction of the orange groves in California, and this was only prevented by the timely introduction from Australia of Vedalia cardinalis, a parasitic coleopterous insect, which luckily soon stamped out the pest. Lecanium hesperidum, Linn., has clearly thus been scattered far and wide over the earth's surface, and Dactylopius adonidum, Linn., bids fair to have a world-wide distribution.

A few remarks about the principle of Coccid classification may not be out of place. Systematic working entomologists find it necessary to amass collections, and the time has passed away when two or three specimens were considered sufficient to represent a species in a collection, indeed forty or fifty, or even one hundred specimens are now necessary to

show the stability or instability of a species its range and all the many points connected with it. Unfortunately systematists, as a rule, do but very little collecting, relying for supplies of specimens chiefly upon the outside public and field naturalists; and it is regrettable that two or three specimens should be considered sufficient to form the type of a new species, as has been the case with many Coccids. It is this pernicious habit of erecting a new species to receive the slightest variation that has already made the list of synonymy so long. When examining an insect it is always advisable to endeavour to find something which will agree with some known species, in preference to fossicking up some trivial variation, for it is this apparently endless "new species" craze that has brought about so much unnecessary confusion and no corresponding advantage. The diagnosis of a species should be so framed as to embrace all the cardinal points, and also admit of any variations to which under various geologic and climatic conditions a species may be subject. The habit of naming "varieties" is also unnecessary and confusing. The characters which separate distinct species are at the best very minute, and not always readily discernible, but to make the line of demarcation narrower by introducing varietal "forms," or "types," is surely not aiming at clearness and convenience, still less so if mere colour and host plants be taken as a basis. The publication of M.S. names has also proved to be alien to clearness, and should be sternly repressed. Mr. T. S. Hall, M.A., in a lecture before the Field Naturalists' Club of Victoria, lately spoke very clearly as to the inconvenience occasioned by the publication of M.S. names.

I also think it necessary to point out to those who have the responsibility of naming new species, or of classification. in general the wanton way in which individual names are used for specific, and even generic purposes. Mr. D. McAlpine in a paper on "Botanical Nomenclature with special reference to Fungi," published by the Australasian Association, 1893, speaks very plainly on this subject, and his remarks are so applicable to the family Coccide that I take the following extract from it. If a new form is worthy of a distinctive name, then surely there is something distinctive about it which can be expressed in the specific name....... Speaking as a teacher and in the interests of science, I would appeal to those who have the responsibility of naming new forms, to give us such names as will linger in the memory, and serve to recall some important feature of form, or habit, or use."

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At this juncture I think all students of Coccids will join in deploring the loss of Mr. W. M. Maskell, of the Wellington