STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 223 



The Japan worm and its hybrids are successfully reared here, and may 

 be seen in the Pavilion (Bomhyx cccropia); is indigenous to our country, 

 from Louisiana to Virginia; lives on elm and willow, and produces 

 coarse silk. 



A fine collection of cocoons are before us. The male and female 

 cocoons differ by their shape and size. The male is smaller, with a cavity 

 upon the neck. The female is more like a bird's egg. The heaviest 

 cocoons offer the greatest chance of affording the best productions. 

 Divide into two parts, weigh both, and find avei'age weight. Sometimes 

 two worms are in one cocoon, and are then called ' : doubles." This sort 

 of produce is alwa}-s inferior, and should be thrown out, as their product 

 is only one-third the value of the normal product. An apparatus was 

 sh wn at the Paris Exhibition, by an Italian, to prevent doubles, and 

 he is endeavoring to bring his contrivance into general use. The appa- 

 ratus consists of cells, made of very light wood, each one of which has 

 the bulk necessary for a single grub, which prevents two grubs getting 

 into one. and making a defective product, and prevents consan- 

 guinity, which is given as one of the causes of the rapid deterior- 

 ation "of the breed. The female is removed when the coupling 

 is over, and made each to lay in the cell reserved, in such a way 

 as to weigh separately the eggs of each laying. Each weighing 

 should be sixty or seventy grains of two and one-eighth pounds 

 of cocoons, each grain to contain from thirteen hundred and fifty to 

 fifteen hundred eggs, average. The eggs to be preserved for reproduc- 

 tion are carefully moistened, when the grub opens the lengthened 

 extremity and issues out. These grubs are collected in pairs, male and 

 female, and fecunded before laying eggs. These cocoons are placed on 

 paper, covered with a coating of paste. Female cocoons are ascertained 

 by being heaviest, and are kept on separate sheets. When the moths 

 appear, they are seized by the wings and placed on stretched cloths. 

 Sheets of paper are placed on screens inclined, on which the females are 

 laid and lay their eggs. These sheets, covered with eggs, are hung on 

 wires in a cool room or cellar, which is not warmed, and there remain 

 until the hatching season. This is important, to keep the eggs healthy. 



Having given a rapid survey of the method of rearing silkworms, we 

 add a few words in reference to winding the cocoons. This is very primi- 

 tive, but requires great care and unremitting attention, and great deli- 

 cacy of touch. Women are generally used for this purpose, who, stand- 

 ing before a sort of loom, have a basin of hot water, into which she casts 

 her cocoons and moves them about to remove the gummy substance 

 which sticks the silken threads of the cocoons together. She beats them 



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wi'iV.a small birch broom, and then attempts to make up a staple by uniting 

 the ends of flue cocoons. These are held in a mass aud are introduced 

 into the hole of a frame for this purpose. Two staples are made at once, 

 on the right and left hand. She brings them together, crosses them, rolls 

 them and twists them several times, the one on the other; then keeps 

 them apart, passing them into a hook, from which they twist into a hank 

 separately on a wheel. The two threads thus twisted are drawn close 

 together, compressed and become one, made into a round roll as before 

 you. This is the reeling of silk, as wo have watched the process in Asia 

 and France. Some of these threads are six miles long. The process of 

 putting i:aw silk into threads, for the different kinds of weaving, is called 

 throwing silk. 



The n lanufacture of silk successfully in California is only a matter of 

 time ami labor. Already a commencement has been made, and your 



