According to M. Craveri, by whom some of the Mexican bread, and of the insects yielding it, were brought to Europe, these insects and their eggs are very common in the fresh waters of the lagunes of Mexico. The natives cultivate, in the lagune of Chalco, a sort of carex called touté, on which the insects readily deposit their eggs. Numerous bundles of these plants are made, which are taken to a lagune, the Texcuco, where they float in great numbers in the water. The insects soon come and deposit their eggs on the plants, and in about a month the bundles are removed from the water, dried, and then beaten over a large cloth to separate the myriad of eggs with which the insects have covered them. These eggs are then cleaned and sifted, put into sacks like flour, and sold to the people for making a sort of cake or biscuit called “hautlé,” which forms a tolerably good food, but has a fishy taste, and is slightly acid. The bundles of carex are replaced in the lake, and afford a fresh supply of eggs, which process may be repeated for an indefinite number of times. It appears that these insects have been used from an early period, for Thomas Gage, a religionist, who sailed to Mexico in 1625, says, in speaking of articles sold in the markets, that they had cakes made of a sort of scum collected from the lakes of Mexico, and that this was also sold in other towns. Brantz Mayer, in his Mexico as it was and as it is, 1844, says: “On the lake of Texcuco I saw men occupied in collecting the eggs of flies from the surface of plants, and cloths arranged in long rows as places of resort for the insects. These eggs, called _agayacath_, formed a favorite food of the Indians long before the conquest; and when made into cakes, resemble the roe of fish, having a similar taste and appearance. After the use of frogs in France, and birds’-nests in China, I think these eggs may be considered a delicacy, and I found that they are not rejected from the tables of the fashionable inhabitants of the capital.” The more recent observations of MM. Saussure, Sallé, Virlet d’Aoust, etc. have confirmed the facts already stated, at least in the most essential particulars.