which grew spontaneously on the sides of the mountains of Oaxaca. Gathering the females before laying, the species would soon be destroyed; and to obviate this progressive destruction, and prevent the mixture of the cotton and mealy cochineals on the same cactus, (the former depriving the latter of all nourishment,) nopaleries were established by the natives.

The plants on which the two species of cochineal are propagated, are essentially different; and this undoubted fact is one of those which indicate a primitive and specific difference between the grana fina, and the grana silvestre. Is it probable if the mealy cochineal was merely a variety of the cotton cochi- . neal, that it would perish on the same cactus which serves for nourishment to the latter, and which botanists designate by the names of cactus opuntia, C. tuna, and C. ficus indica? M. Thiery in the work already frequently referred to by us*, asserts that in the plain Cul-de Sac in Saint Domingo, the cottoncochineal does not live on the cactus tuna, but on the C. pereskia, which he classes among the articulated Indian figs. I am afraid that this naturalist has confounded a variety of opuntia, with the true pereskia, which is a tree with large and thick leaves, and on which I never yet found any cochineal. I look upon

*P. 275-282.

it also as extremely doubtful, that the plant called by Linneus cactus coccinellifer, cultivated in Europe, is the nopal on which the Indians of Oaxaca rear the mealy cochineal. M. Decandolle* who has thrown much light on this subject, appears to be of my opinion; for he cites the wild nopal of Thiery de Menouville, as synonimous with the cochineal Indian fig, which is entirely different from that of the plantations. In fact Linneus gave the name of cactus coccinellifer to the Indian fig, with which several botanical gardens of Europe had received the cotton-cochineal, a species with a purple flower, (Ficus Indica vermiculos proferens of Plukenet) which grows wild in Jamaica, the Island of Cuba, and almost every where in the Spanish Colonies of the Continent. I have shewn this cactus to well informed persons, who had carefully examined the nopaleries of Oaxaca, and they have uniformly told me that the nopal of the plantations is essentially different from it, and that the latter, as is also affirmed by M. Thiery, is never to be found in a wild state. Moreover the Abbe Clavigero who lived five years in Misteca, expressly says, that the fruit of the nopal on which the fine cochineal is reared, is small, insipid, and white, while the fruit of the cactus

* Plantes grasses de M. M. Redouté et Decandolle, livraison 24.

+ T. i. p. 115.

coccinellifer is red. The celebrated Ulloa advances in his works that the true nopal is without prickles; but he appears to have confounded this plant with an Indian fig, which we have frequently found in the gardens, (conucos) of the Indians of Mexico and Peru, and which the creoles on account of its gigantic size, the excellence of its fruits, and the beauty of its articulations, which are of a blueish green, and destitute of prickles, designate by the name of tuna de Castilla. This nopal, the most elegant of all the opuntia, is in fact fit for the nourishment of the mealy cochineal, especially after its birth, but it is seldom to be found in the nopaleries of Oaxaca. If according to the opinion of several distinguished naturalists, the tuna or nopal de Castilla, is but a variety of the ordinary cactus opuntia, originating in cultivation, we must be surprized that the Indian figs cultivated for centuries in our botanical gardens, and those of the nopaleries of New Spain, have never in the same manner lost the prickles, with which the joints are provided.

The Indians of the intendancy of Oaxaca, do not all follow the same method in rearing the cochineal, which M. Thiery de Menonville saw practised in his rapid passage through San Juan del Re, San Antonio and Quicatlan. The

Indians of the district of Sola and Zimatlan*, establish their nopaleries on the slope of mountains, or in ravins, two or three leagues distant from their villages. They plant the nopals after cutting and burning the trees which covered the ground. If they continue to clean the ground twice a year, the young plants are in a condition to maintain the cochineal in the third year. For this purpose the proprietor of a nopalery, purchases in the months of April or May, branches or joints of the tuna de Castilla, laden with small cochineals, (semilla) recently hatched. These branches destitute of roots, and separated from the trunks, preserve their juice for several months. They are sold for about three francs the hundred in the market of Oaxaca. The Indians preserve the semilla of the cochineal for twenty days in caverns, or in the interior of their huts, and after this period they expose the young coccus to the open air. The branches to which the insect is attached, are suspended under a shed

covered with a straw roof. The growth of the cochineal is so rapid, that even in the months of August and September, we find mothers already big before the young are yet hatched. These mother-cochineals are placed in nests, made of a species of tillandsia, called paxtle. They are carried in these nests two or

* Informe de Don Francisco Ibañez de Corvera. (M. S )

three leagues from the village, and distributed in the nopaleries, where the young plants receive the semilla. The laying of the mother-cochineal lasts from thirteen to fifteen days. If the situation of the plantation is not very elevated, the first harvest may be expected in less than four months. It is observed, that in a climate more cold than temperate, the colour of the cochineal is equally beautiful, but that the harvest is much later. In the plain, the mother-cochineals grow to a greater size, but they meet with more enemies in the innumerable quantity of insects, (xicaritas, perritos, aradores, agujas, armadillos, culebritas,) lizards, rats, and birds, by which they are devoured, Much care is necessary in cleaning the branches of the nopals. The Indian women make use of a squirrel, or stag's tail for that purpose; they squat down for hours together beside one plant; and notwithstanding the excessive price of the cochineal, it is to be doubted if this cultivation would be profitable, in countries where the time and labour of man might be turned to account. At Sola, where very cold rains occasionally fall, and where it even frequently freezes in the month of January, the natives preserve the young cochineals, by covering the nopals with rush mats. The price of the semilla of grana fina, which generally does not amount to more than five francs per pound, frequently rises there to 18 and 20.