THE AMERICAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 



"3 



mestic varieties have sprung; it deposits 

 its eggs directly on the branches of the 

 trees.* 



There is a very well known Chinese 

 legend that attributes to a queen the arts 

 by which silk has been made usefid to 

 mankind. If she had lived in an age when 

 inventors took out patents, she might have 

 based her claims for originality on three 

 points: first, collecting the insects in a 

 place prepared for them, where she herself 

 fed them; second, reeling the fiber from 

 the cocoons; third, making garments of 

 silk. These claims would not be invali- 

 dated by the fact that her husband, the 

 emperor Hoang Ti, suggested the ex[)eri- 

 ments to her and urged the attemjjt for the 

 sake of the hapjjiness of his people. He 

 seems to have thought that the product of 

 the Silkworm could be utilized; she is 

 credited with the actual performance. Her 



(Fig. 40. 



MuLHERRV SiLKWOKM ; cocoon (after Riley). 



grateful subjects have accorded to her di- 

 vine honors; she is the tloddess of Silk- 

 worms. The ceremonies of worshijiping 

 this divinity, whose name is Si ling chi, are 

 performed at the season of the year when 

 the eggs of the Silkworm are hatched. 

 Silk-culture in China is closely inwoven 

 with religious observances, and the details 

 are given with minuteness in the Book of 

 Rites by Confucius. Authorities differ 

 enormously in fixing the date of Hoang Ti's 

 reign; it was probably not less than i,8oo 

 nor more than 2,600 years before the 

 Christian era. He was the third emperor 

 of China; another of the monarchs of that 

 country has a high place in their pantheon 



*Le Cocon de Soie: E. Duseigneur — Kelber: Paris, 187.5. 



because he encouraged the cultivation of 

 the mulberry tree. The early historic- 

 books of the Chinese describe the occu- 

 pation of different provinces successively, 

 and, in connection therewith, mention in- 

 stances where, in different localities, the 

 culture of the mulberry was then begun. 



[Fig. 41.] 



Mulberry Silkworm: inolh (after Riley), 



While the date at which the Silkworm 

 first became useful was very much later in 

 Jafjan than in China, it is equally shrouded 

 by the mists of a great antiquity. The 

 legends are wholly mythologic; but though 

 none of them have an historic dignity much 

 above folk-lore, there is one that has per- 

 manently fixed itself in the Japanese lan- 

 guage by conferring technical terms on the 

 stages of the silkworm's growth. 



A certain king of India had many wives 

 and a considerable family; but the wife 

 whom he loved best had borne him no 

 children. At last, however, she announced 

 to him that she was about to become a 

 mother, and the king took a far deeper in- 

 terest in the event than was usual with 

 him on such occasions. He hoped to have 

 an heir that would at a future day worthily 

 fill the throne. Great was his disappoint- 

 ment when the midwives brought to him a 

 daughter instead of a son. He made a 

 most unfatherly remark about the baby; 

 this was repeated in the palace, and came 

 to the ears of the mother, to whose illness 

 it gave an unhappy turn, so that the king 

 was soon called upon to lament her loss. 

 The double sorrow and remorse for his 

 hasty words preyed upon the heart of the 

 king, and before many weeks he was buried 

 with his much-loved consort. 



The baby, known as Youan Thsan, was 

 left in charge of some of its numerous 

 stepmothers, who, very naturally, soon 



