THE STATE ENTOMOLOGIST. . 113 



lanited in parallel bands, but these eharactei-s cannot be relied on as 

 they connect by variations: in cynthia the rosy band across the wings 

 is broader than in ricini : the crescent-shaped lunule on the front wings of 

 •cynthia is yellow beneath, the yellow being bordered with white above; in 

 ricini the white surrounds the yellow, and the lunule is generally smaller. 

 A third species by the name of Gnerinii has been described, but with 

 scarcely any evidence that it is anything more than a variety of either 

 •of the former. 



RETROSPECTIVE HISTORY OF THE AILANTHUS SILKWORM. 



The Allan thus silkworm was first mentioned in the writings of mission- 

 aries about the middle of the last centuiy. In 1760 or 1765, according to 

 Dr. Morris, a fair figure of the moth was published by D'Aubenton the 

 younger, who called it the Croissant."^'- In 1773 Drury gave the moth the 

 name which it now bears, but its larva, and general habits were not known 

 till the middle of the present centurj^. 



The first eggs of the.Ailanthus silkworm obtained in Europe were sent 

 b}^ the Abbe Fantoni, a Piedmontese missionary, from the province 

 of Shang Tung, a little south of Pekin, in the north of China, to some 

 friends at T urin . From these eggs two successive generations of worms were 

 produced in 1857, and in 1858 Mons. Guerin-Meneville received from Turin, 

 both eggs and fertile female^, and exjjerimented with them in the acclima- 

 tization gardens in Paris. 



From the veiy outset this worm promised well. It adapted itself read- 

 ily to the climate and its food-plant was everj^where abundant. Soon after 

 its introduction into France it attracted the attention of scientific men in 

 England and other parts of Eui'ope; and the Emperor himself, charmed b}- 

 the tune of the words chanted to him bj" M. Guerin-Meneville, and the evi- 

 dent prospect of the success of the new enterprise, lent his aid to the carrying- 

 out of experiments on a large scale, and in the summer of 1859 thousands of 

 the caterpillars were reared on M. Aquillon's property at Toulon, and also 

 on that of Count Lamotte Barace, near Chinon, (Indre et Loire). 



In 1859 Mr. F. Moore of the East India Museum, reared a few in Eng- 

 land, and exhibited them before the London Entomological Society. Sub- 

 sequenth^ they were fully tested in England .by Lady Dorothy Nevill of 

 Dangstein, Dr. Alexander Wallace of London and others. Mr. Wallace, in 

 1865 jDublished an interesting memoir on the subject, entitled " Ailanthicul- 

 ture, or the Prosj^ect of a new English Industrj-," in which he showed that 

 the worm did ver}^ well in that moist climate. Indeed it was supposed to 

 do better in England than in France, and the following paragraph w^hich I 

 quote from the memoir will very w^ell reflect the opinions and hopes enter- 

 tained at the time. 



In 1862, at Lady D. J^evill's town house, I first beheld these beautiful 

 larva3 feeding on the leaves of the Ailanthus glandidosa. In 1863 I became 

 possessed, through the kindness of her lad^^ship, of some eggs and procured 

 others from France, and I obtained that summer, as also in 1865, tw^o gen- 



'Planches il' Histoirenat., cnliiminees, X, pi. 42. Ins. 



s 



