216 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



trees, and the price of the whole cocoons is about 600 the 

 rupee. It follows that Assam ought to be in a much better 

 position to supply cocoons to the English silk-spinner than the 

 principal tusser producing districts of Bengal. If a similar 

 calculation be made with regard to eri cocoons, the result appears 

 still more favourable. 



Previous attempts to develop Silk Cultivation. — No attempt 

 seems ever to have been made to develop the cultivation of 

 viuga for the English market, but we have the record of Mr. 

 C. H. Lepper's experiment with eri in the Lakhimpur district 

 about 1872-73. Mr. Lepper was commissioned by Messrs. 

 Lister & Co. to take up land and try the experiment of rearing 

 the e7'i worm on a large scale, so as to thoroughly prove the 

 practicability of procuring silk in sufficient quantity to make 

 the business pay. His choice of a site in the southern portion 

 of Lakhimpur was perhaps an unfortunate one, as the worm is 

 much more widely cultivated on the confines of Kamrup and 

 Darrang. He found the climatic conditions exceptionally 

 favourable, the supply of food abundant, and the worm so 

 peculiarly adapted to breeding as to suggest the belief that with 

 proper care a constant rotation of crops could be obtained, so 

 that the operations of breeding and spinning might go on 

 uninterruptedly all the year round. Some experiments made 

 with the cocoons also pointed to the possibility of considerably 

 improving them in size and quality. But the difficulty of 

 procuring labour, and its costliness when procured (local labour 

 being quite inefficient) were so great as to deter him from 

 advising Messrs. Lister and Co. to continue operations. His 

 own estimate was that the cost of suitable buildings on even a 

 moderate scale, to replace the native style of house, which is 

 not proof against damp, rats, or insects, would not be less 

 than ;£3G00. A similar attempt was made some six years ago by 

 a European in the neighbourhood of Rangia, in Kamrup, but he 

 was compelled to abandon it after losing his entire crop by 

 disease. 



Experiments noio being made. — In the face of these pre- 

 cedents, the prospects of eri cultivation on a large scale, 

 either by the Government or by private enterprise, is not 

 encouraging, and the difficulties are still greater in respect 

 of miiya. But the case is different with the native breeder, who 



