1 Syst. Nat. Gmelin, 2220.

Cl. 5. Ord. 2. Insecta Hemiptera.2

G. 229. Rostrum or Snout seated on the breast. Antenna filiform. Abdomen bristled behind. Wings two, erect in the males; females apterous.

Species 22. C. Cacti. Cochineal Insect. Reaum. Ins. iv. t 7. fig. 11,12. Phil. Trans. iii. 661. pl 21. Brandt & Ratziburg Medizinische Zoologie, ii. 217.

Officinal. Cocci, Lond. Coccus Cacti, Edin. Dub. Cochineal.

Syn. Cochenille ( F.), Cochenille, Koschenille, Scharlachwurm ( G.), Cochenilje (Dutch), Koskenillen (Swed.), Cuzzinel (Dan.), Cocciniglia (I.), Cochinilla (S.), Cochineel poochie ( Tarn.).

This coccus is found in its wild state in Mexico, Georgia, South Carolina, and some of the West India islands, feeding on several species of cactus, particularly the common Indian fig, or prickly-pear plant (Cactus Opuntia)3: but in Mexico, particularly in the provinces Oaxaca and Guaxaca, and some of the adjoining Spanish settlements4, where the insect is, as it were, domesticated and reared with great care, it feeds only on a species of cactus which was supposed to be the Cochineal Indian fig (Cactus coccinilifer); but which, Humboldt says, is a distinct species, the fruit being internally white. It is cultivated for this purpose; and on it the insect attains to a greater size than in the wild state. It is a small insect, very seldom exceeding a barley-grain in magnitude; with the head, except in the males, scarcely distinct from the body, which is depressed, downy, and transversely rugose. The abdomen is of a purplish-red colour, flat below and convex above; and the legs are six in number, short and black.

The males, which are few in proportion to the females, there being one only to 100 or 200 females, are winged, slender, and active, with the body of a red colour: the head is small, but very distinct from the neck, furnished with jointed feelers, and two long diverging white hairs, about five times the length of the body, which proceed from the tail: the body is elliptical, and furnished with white wings, which lie flat when the insect rests or walks, but are erected when it flies. The females have no wings and are sluggish, and after impregnation scarcely ever move from the part of the plant where they fix themselves. The back is hemispherical and crossed by numerous wrinkles; the body is of a much deeper red than that of the males; on the breast is an awl-shaped papilla, through which a fine thread is spun to form a web, with which the insect envelopes itself as soon as it is fully impregnated; when it becomes torpid, and immediately after laying its eggs dies, and is a mere useless husk.

Dioscoridis is the Kermes or Coccus Ilicis, Linn, which was known, as a dye, by the Phoenicians before the time of Moses; and was the tola of the Jews. Beckmari's Hist, of Inventions, translation, vol. ii. p. 185.

2 Cl. vii. Rhyngota, Spec. 21. Fabricii.

3 These plants have neither stem nor leaves, in the common acceptation of these words, but consist of roundish or oval compressed joints, that grow out of each other.

4 "Kascala, Chulula, Nueva Gallicia, Chiapa, in New Spain; and Hambatio, Loja, and Tucuman, produce the greatest quantity," Ulloa, quoted by Bancroft.

The wild cochineal is collected six times in the year, just before the females begin to lay their eggs; a few being left on the plants to furnish a future supply. But the domesticated insect is collected thrice only in the same space of time, the domestication diminishing the number of broods to three in the year, owing to their propagation being suspended during the rainy seasons, whilst the downy covering of the wild species allows them to withstand the inclemency of these seasons. At the third gathering, branches of the plant, to which a certain number of females is left adhering, are broken off, and preserved with great care under cover during the rainy season; and after this is over they are distributed over the out-door plantations of the cactus, where they soon multiply, and in the space of two months the first crop is fit to be gathered. The insects are detached from the plant by means of a blunt knife, then put into bags and dipped into boiling water to kill them; after which they are dried in the sun : and although they lose two thirds of their weight in this process, yet about 600,000 lbs.1 are brought annually to Europe.

Cochineal was used by the natives of Mexico, when the Spaniards arrived there in 1518; and was introduced into Europe about the year 1523. The domesticated kind, which is not only much larger, but yields a richer colour, and is consequently most esteemed, is known in the language of the Spanish merchants by the name grana fina: the wild is one half the size only of the other, covered with white down or powder, and is denominated grana silvestra; but as we receive them, both the kinds are often mixed together. They are imported in bags, each containing about two hundred weight, and have the appearance of small, dry, shrivelled, rugose berries or seeds, of a deep brown purple or mulberry colour, with a white matter between the wrinkles. In this state they suffer no change from length of keeping. Dr. Bancroft directs that cochineal to be chosen as the best, which "is large, plump, dry, and of a silver-white colour on the surface."1

1 Each pound is said to contain 70,000 insects. The monopoly of cochineal is still in the hands of the Spaniards; but attempts are making to propagate it in the East Indies, if the death of Dr. Anderson has not terminated them. Of the whole quantity brought to Europe, about 150,000 lbs. may he considered as the present annual consumption of Great Britain (1812), which at 30s. per lb. cost 225,000l. sterling.

Qualities.-Cochineal has a faint, heavy odour, and a bitter, austere taste. It is easily pulverized, affording a powder of a purplish red hue, which has been found to be composed chiefly of carmine, (a peculiaranimal matter,) a fatty matter, phosphate and carbonate of lime, and muriate and phosphate of potassa2: the colouring matter is taken up by water, alcohol, and solutions of the pure alkalies. The watery infusion is of a violet crimson, the alcoholic of a deep crimson, and the alkaline of a deep purple, or rather violet hue. The colour of the watery infusion is brightened by all the acids; it is destroyed by chlorine. It is brightened also by bitar-trate of potassa and alum; and, at the same time, is partly precipitated. It is also precipitated by sulphate of iron of a . brownish violet colour, the liquid remaining a pale yellowish brown; and by sulphate of zinc and acetate of lead of a purple violet, the liquid being perfectly colourless: cochineal, therefore, is incompatible as a colouring matter with these metallic salts.

According to the analysis of Pelletier and Caventou, it contains carmine (cochinaline), a fatty matter, phosphate and carbonate of lime, hydrochlorate and phosphate of potassa, and potassa united to an animal acid.2

Medical properties and uses.-Cochineal has lately been recommended as an antispasmodic and anodyne in hooping-cough. I have had no experience of its effects as an antispasmodic, and still less so as an anodyne in neuralgia, for which it has been extolled by M. Sauter, who gave one hundred and twenty drops of a saturated tincture, morning and evening. It is well fitted for giving a fine colour to tinctures and similar preparations.