CHAP. C. URTICA‘CEH. MO RUS. 1351 
worms on wild mulberry trees, and applied their silk to use. From China, the 
art passed into Persia, India, Arabia, and the whole of Asia. The caravans 
of Seres, or Serica (the part of China where the silk was most abundantly 
produced ), “ performed long journeys, of 243 days, from the ‘ far coasts’ of 
China to those of Syria. The expedition of Alexander into Persia and India 
first introduced the knowledge of silk to the Grecians, 350 years before Christ; 
and, with the increase of wealth and luxury in the Grecian court, the de- 
mand for silks prodigiously augmented. The Persians engrossed, for a time, 
the trade of Greece, and became rich from the commerce of silk, which they 
procured from China. The ancient Pheenicians also engaged in the traffic of 
silk, and carried it to the east of Europe; but, for a long time, even those who 
brought it to Europe knew not what it was, and neither how it was pro- 
duced, nor where was situated the country of Serica, from which it originally 
came.” (Kenrick’s Amer. Silk-Grower’s Guide, p. 11.; N. Du Ham.,4.; Nowv. 
Cours d@ Agric., &c.) From Greece it passed into Rome; and, though the 
exact year of its introduction is unknown, it was probably about the time of 
Pompey and Julius Cesar ; the latter, we find, having used it in his festivals. 
In the reign of Tiberius, an edict was passed prohibiting the use of silk as 
effeminate. Heliogabalus, about 220, is said to have been the first emperor 
who wore a robe made entirely of silk; which then, and for some time after- 
wards, sold for its weight in gold. Aurelian, in 280, is said to have denied 
his empress, Severa, a robe of silk, because it was too dear. About the be- 
ginning of the sixth century, after the seat of the Roman empire had been 
transferred to Constantinople, two monks arrived at the court of the Emperor 
Justinian, from a missionary expedition into China: they had brought with 
them the seeds of the mulberry, and communicated to him the discovery of 
the mode of rearing silkworms. Although the exportation of the insects from 
China was prohibited on pain of death, yet, by the liberal promises and the 
persuasions of Justinian, they were induced to undertake to import some from 
that country; and they returned from their expedition through Bucharia 
and Persia to Constantinople in 555, with the eggs of the precious insects, 
which they had obtained in the “ far country,” concealed in the hollow of 
their canes, or pilgrim’s staves. Until this time, the extensive manufactures 
of Tyre and Berytes had received the whole of their supply of raw silk from 
China through Persia. (See M‘Culloch’s Dict. of Com., Nouv. Cours, and Amer. 
Silk-Grower's Guide.) “The eggs thus obtained were hatched in a hot-bed, 
and, being afterwards carefully fed and attended to, the experiment proved 
successful, and the silkworm became very generally cultivated throughout 
Greece.”’( Sat. Mag. vol. iii. p. 2.) The silkworm and the black mulberry were 
introduced simultaneously into Spain and Portugal by the Arabs, or Saracens, 
on their conquest of Spain in 711, When the silkworm was first introduced into 
the north of Europe, there appears little doubt but that it was fed on the leaves 
of the black mulberry. The white mulberry is more tender ; and, putting forth 
its leaves much earlier than the black mulberry, it is more likely to be injured 
by spring frosts. It was, consequently, long confined to Greece; but, when 
Roger, king of Sicily, in 1130, ravaged the Peloponnesus, he compelled the 
principal artificers in silk, and breeders of silkworms, to remove with him to 
Palermo, and determined to try the white mulberry in that country. The 
white mulberry was accordingly transplanted into Sicily ; and, flourishing in 
its fine climate, that island became the great mart of nearly all the raw silk 
required for the manufactures of Europe. On Mount Aétna, the Morus 
nigra is grown at an elevation of 2500 ft., for the silkworm, to the exclusion 
of M. alba, probably on account of the tenderuess of the latter tree in that 
elevated region. (See Dr. R. A. Philippi on the vegetation of Mount tna, in 
the Linnea, as quoted in Hook. Comp. Bot. Mag., vol.i. p. 50.) In 1440, 
the white mulberry was introduced into Upper Italy; and, under the reign of 
Charles VIL. the first white mulberry tree was planted in France, as it is said, 
by the Seigneur d’ Allan; and it is added that this tree still exists at the gates 
of Montelimart. Silk manufactures were first established in France in 1480, 
at Tours. This was in the reign of Louis XI. ; that monarch having invited 
