130 NORTH AMERICAN INSECTS. 
look like grains of rice, but which are nothing but the co- 
coons of small Ichneumon flies, which have been raised in 
the body of that caterpillar, and work themselves out of its 
skin when ready for their own metamorphosis into a co- 
coon. ‘This change takes place very rapidly, and then they 
fall to the ground to await their final transformation into 
a perfect Ichneumon. 
Lastly, caterpillars are not only indirectly useful to man, 
but they are directly of the greatest importance to him; 
they not only indirectly furnish him with palatable food, 
but they directly supply him with his costliest and most 
beautiful apparel. Whata rebuke for human pride! The 
gaudy and spangled robes that deck earth’s greatest po- 
tentates are originally woven by the despised worm that 
crawls beneath their feet! What a profound lesson in the 
economy of nature, and how striking an illustration of the 
dependence of all created things! An apparently insignifi- 
cant caterpillar becomes one of the most important articles 
in the manufacture and commerce of the world. An infant 
butterfly weaves its own beautiful colors into a texture that 
becomes not only the splendid and appropriate ornament 
of female beauty, but also the insignia of office, rank, and 
power. The academic gown, the priestly vestments, and 
the monarch’s royal robes were all once inclosed within the 
cocoon of a silk-worm. 
This caterpillar is the most renowned and the most prof- 
itable of all, and is extensively cultivated in France, Italy, 
Greece, Turkey, Persia, China, and Transcaucassia,* and 
might as well be cultivated in this country, if the importa- 
-tion of foreign silk and the tariff did not operate against 
this branch of industry. We have, however, quite a num- 
ber of Moths, indigenous to this country, the cocoons of 
which might also furnish a very valuable, strong, and ex- 
* See B. JAncEr’s Versuch einer Darstellung des natiirlicher Reich- 
thums der russischen Ldnder jenseits des Caucasus. Leipzig, 1830. 
