nigrum Nietn. Only two papers (Essig, 1931; Smith, 1939) are devoted entirely to the nigra scale. The first published account-of the nigra scale is the original brief description in a treatise on coffee pests by Nietner (1861). This treatise was reprinted in a British journal (Nietner, 1862), translated and published in a French journal (Nietner, 1863-64), and issued in a revised edition (Nietner, 1880), each time under a slightly different title. These four printings of the contribution account for the discrepancy in bibliographical citations by different authors. EARLY HISTORY OF THE NIGRA SCALE IN CALIFORNIA Plant-quarantine reports of the California State Board of Horticulture indicate that the nigra scale was frequently found on plants shipped into this state before 1900. For many years the insect was known by three specific names: Lecanium nigrum Nietner, Lecanium depressum Targioni, and Leca,nium begoniae Douglas. Alexander Craw (1894)3 briefly discussed the insect under the name depressed scale, Lecanium depressum, as follows: A dark, flattened, oblong scale, frequently found upon palms and other plants imported from the Sandwich Islands. It resembles a full-grown "soft orange scale" (L. hesperidum) , but is darker. From the amount of black smut and the dirty appearance of the infested plants, I consider this would be as troublesome a pest as the other Lecaniums that have gained a foothold in the State. Accompanying the statement is a sketch showing a section of a palm leaf and four adult scales. Two years later Craw (1896) made the following statement under the topic "New black scale, Lecamium nigrum Nietner" : A smooth, oval, shiny, black scale found upon ferns and other plants from the Sandwich Islands. It has been reported to exist in India and Ceylon, where it attacks coffee. Professor Cockerell says it is seldom found on the coffee, though "sometimes present in large numbers upon the croton-oil plant and the eeara rubber, 'where it produces the usual effect, viz., a heavy fall of leaf and black fungus." A photograph of a section of a fern leaf bearing several adult scales is shown in this report (Craw, 1896, pI. VI, fig. 6), and the statement is made that all plants found infested with the scale were destroyed. So far as disclosed by the present study, the first records of the establishment of the nigra scale in California are in the scale-insect collections of E. O. Essig at the University of California and G. F. Ferr-is at Stanford University. These specimens were examined by the writer in June, 1940. Essig has two vials and Ferris one, all three containing midrib sections of a leaf, to which are attached adult nigra scales and labels stating that the insects were collected by E. 1\1. Ehrhorn on Monstera deliciosa in a greenhouse in Golden Gate Park in San Francisco June 11, 1906. Ferris's vial is a part of a collection made by O. E. Bremner, who was connected with the California state quarantine service when Ehrhorn was chief of that service. Bremner' says that he well remembers a large specimen ...