ORDER IV. MOTHS AND BUTTERFLIES. 153 



From this statistical table it will be seen that the de- 

 crease of raised silk-cocoons in this country amounts to 

 50,208 pounds; but at the same time we perceive with 

 pleasure that they were rather increasing in the State of 

 New York, and still more in Maine, Indiana, and Tennes- 

 see. In Kentucky, also, according to the last census, 544 

 pounds of silk-cocoons were produced more than at the date 

 of the preceding census. 



But our limits will not allow us longer to dwell upon the 

 history and rearing of the Silk-worm, and we pass to the 

 consideration of its caterpillars, only referring our readers 

 for more complete details to the mosj: modern and perhaps 

 the best work on the subject, viz., that of Count Dandolo, 

 of Venice : " DelV arte di governare i bachi da setta. Mila- 

 no, 1819." 



The Cecrojna, Polypheme, Luna, and Promethea Moths. 



This noble family of large Moths is, perhaps, the hand- 

 somest of all the nocturnal lepidoptera. They are beauti- 

 fully covered with soft down, and are ornamented with a 

 great variety of splendid colors. It seems, at first view, 

 strange that colors so beautiful should be found on insects 

 that display themselves only at night ; but it is not, after 

 all, in dissonance with the poetry of Nature that they should 

 be seen sporting only in the calm, starry night, on the soft 

 breezes that are laden with delicious fragrance, when the 

 fire-flies glisten on the earth like the reflection of twinkling 

 stars on the bosom of the placid water, and the mysterious 

 whip-poor-will or the lugubrious owl whistle their melan- 

 choly music through the sombre forest. Often have we 

 roamed through Nature's open temple till the blazing sun 

 had gone to rest; and, overcome with the day's fatigue, 

 have laid us down amidst the fragrance of wild flowers, 

 only to dream of things the day could not reveal. Thus 

 in the depths of slumber have we often laid, and in dreamy 



G2 



