220 TEA AND SILK FARMING IN NEW ZEALAND. 



weeks after the silk season, the traveller can scarcely enter a 

 farmhouse or peasant's hut without seeing one or more girls 

 seated before caldrons of hot water covered with bobbing cocoons, 

 busy 'Unwinding the golden threads ; and the money they earn in 

 this manner during a comparatively short period forms no in- 

 considerable portion of the family's yearly income. In some of 

 the regular sericicultural establishments, particularly in parts of 

 the district of Kiangnan, still further operations are undertaken. 

 In rear of one of these may be observed a series of sheds arranged 

 round a shallow tank, where the floretta is cleansed previously to 

 being passed on to bleachers and dyers. He may then follow it 

 through other stages, all in the same premises, until it is seen 

 exposed for sale as thread, floss for embroidery, or woven into 

 fabrics possessing all the colours of the rainbow. 



A summary of the preceding information will show — 



1. That the timely use of ice enables the sericiculturist to 

 retard the hatching of silkworms' eggs, thus allowing them to be 

 conveyed to distant countries, or kept during inclement seasons 

 until the natural food of the worms is ready. 



2. That this expedient is practised on the Continent of Europe, 

 and has within the last few years been verified, on a large scale 

 by Captain Mason, to be attended by no evil results. 



3. That the silkworm passes through six distinct and well- 

 marked epochs from the egg to the cocoon, during w^hich the 

 most scrupulous cleanliness should be maintained, and an un- 

 stinted allowance of periodically fresh food supplied. 



4. That the worms from 1 ounce of eggs, having devoured 

 1500 lbs. of mulberry leaves, should yield a harvest of 120 lbs. 

 of cocoons. 



5. That cocoons quickly reeled, without destroying the chrysalis 

 within and before it has had time to perforate its prison, yield 

 50 per cent, more silk than the same number would after the 

 insect had been stifled. 



6. That the sexes of the imprisoned moths are known by the 

 shape of the cocoons. 



7. That 1 lb. weight of good cocoons should yield moths 

 capable of producing 1 ounce of grain, each female laying from 

 300 to 600 eggs. 



8. And that the loss in weight cocoons suffer through desicca- 

 tion is over 60 per cent. 



If these few particulars connected with tea and silk prepara- 

 tion have conveyed the impression intended, the reader will 

 probably be inclined to accept without much question the belief 

 of the writer that those industries are peculiarly well adapted 

 to be conducted together on the same estate by much the same 

 staff of workers and under the same general management. In 



