The history of silk, cotton, linen, wool, and other fibrous ... - Cd3wd.com

124 CULTIVATION AND MANUFACTURE OF SILK.
tations among the branches, uncontrolled by the hand and un-
assisted by the cares of man. As soon, however, as the silken
balls have been constructed, they are appropriated by the uni-
versal usurper, who spares only the few required to reproduce
their numbers, and thus furnish him with successive harvests*.
This silk, the spontaneous offering of nature, is not, however,
equal in fineness to that produced by worms under shelter, and
whose progressions are influenced by careful management.
Much attention is, therefore, bestowed by the Chinese in the
artificial rearing of silk-worms. One of their principal cares,
is to prevent ihe too early hatching of the eggs, to which the
nature tf the cUmate so strongly disposes them. The mode
of insuring the requisite delay, is, to cause the moth to deposit
her eggs on large sheets of paper : these, immediately upon
their production, are suspended from a beam in the room, while
the wdndows are opened to expose them to the air. In a few
days the papers are taken down and rolled loosely up with the
eggs inside, in which form they are again hung during the
remainder of the summer and autumn. Towards the end of
the year they are immersed in cold water wherein a small por-
tion of salt has been dissolved. In this state the eggs are left
during two days ; and on being taken from the salt and water
are first hung to dry, and then rolled up rather more tightly
than before, each sheet of paper being thereafter inclosed in a
* Mons. Marteloy of Montpelier, who made many experiments upon the rear-
ing of silk-worms, presented a memorial upon the subject to the French minister,
in compliance with whose recommendation, a few silk growers of Languedoc
caused an experiment to be publicly made in the open air, in the garden belong-
ing to the Jesuits' college at Montpelier. The whole was placed under the direc-
tion of Mons. Marteloy, who had 1200 livres assigned to him to defray the neces-
sary expenses. The experiment succeeded perfectly. This was in 1764. In
the following year a second trial was made, and 1800 livres were set apart for
the expenses. Owing, however, to the unfavorable nature of the season, this ex-
periment failed entirely, the heavy and incessant rains making it impossible to
keep the food of the worms in a sufficiently dry state. The rearing of silk-worms
in the open air was not again attempted in that quarter; but the partial success
led to the adoption among cultivators of a better system of ventilation, and the
production of silk was about this time very much extended througliout Langue-
doc.
—
Obs. on the Culture of Silk, by A. Stephenson.