WINTER MEETING. 231 



be weighed ap to Pereiaa monarchs and Phoeuician mercbants against 

 the purest gold, and only used as apparel by the greatest pereonages 

 and on the most important occasions. For more than two thousand 

 years distant and exclusive China kept the deiivation and manufacture 

 of silk as one of her most important state secrets, and derived from it 

 a very considerable part of her revenues. About the middle of the 

 sixth century the secret was filched from her by two Christian monks, 

 who, while directing the eyes of the heathen to spiritual matters, 

 directed their own material vision to the source and methods of work- 

 ing up of silk, and, after much difficulty and artifice, contrived to secrete 

 a few eggs and the seeds of the mulberry in their staves and in this 

 way to convey them safely to Italy. In its new home the silk worm 

 flourished even more than in its native land, and its culture rapidly 

 spread over Italy, Spain, Portugal, Prance and Sicily, and become one 

 of the most profitable industries of these countries. 



Many attemps at silk culture have been made in America, but 

 while both insects and plants flourish admirably in many localities, the 

 cost in labor of producing the silk has been too great to enable it to 

 compete with the raw silk of China, Japan and of Europe. But sericul- 

 turists are still sanguine that conditions will become such that it may 

 be profitably produced in the United States. Bombyx mori is not the 

 only species of caterpillar whose cocoon can be utilized to the needs 

 of man. The " Yarna mai,^^ an immense Bombycid of Northern Japan, 

 which feeds on oak and forms a very large and compact, sulphur yellow 

 cocoon, is used by the Japanese in the production of what is called 

 "Tusseh silk," not so fine and smooth as that of the silk worm proper, 

 but exceedingly strong and glossy and well adapted to many kinds of 

 goods. The Silanthus silk worm fSamia cynthiaj, which makes a 

 smaller and more cylindrical cocoon, has also been quite successfully 

 experimented with and has become naturalized in most of the coast 

 cities south of New York. Our own grand Cecropia, whose loose 

 meshed, glossy, brown cocoon is largest of all, has been found to yield 

 an excellent quality of silk, so also has the larva of our lovely, delicate 

 hued Luna, but much difficulty has been experienced in rearing these 

 species in congregations sufficiently large to derive any profit from the 

 product. But, with the necessity for more earnest attention and experi- 

 ment, it is probable that all difficulties could be overcome, and all these 

 excellent fibers utilized, in which case the insects, that are now re- 

 garded as pests, wonla become a source of revenue and the objects of 

 intelligent care and interest. 



Next to the silk worm in value ranks the honey bee f Aphis nulijicaj, 

 the "Whiteman's fly," as it was called by the Indians, who, in early 



