41 [ 175 3 



they hang out on the as.icen trees, when the proper season for the 

 motii arrives. 



Du Hakie* mentions that in the province of Chantong, there is 

 found a species of silk in great quantities on trees and in the tielJs, 

 which is spun and made inio a sluff called Kieiit-chou. This silk is 

 the production of little insects much like caterpillars, which do not 

 spin cocoons, hut very long threads; and, heing driven about by the 

 wind, hang upon thcj trees and bushes, and are gathered for use. The 

 stuff is much coarser than that' made of silk spun in houses. The 

 worms are wild, and eat indifferently the leaves of the mulberry and 

 other trees; they are of two kinds; one is much larger and blacker than 

 the common silkworms, and are called Tsouen-Kien; the other, the 

 Tyan-Kien, are much smaller. The silk of the first is of a reddish 

 gray^ mat of the other is darker. The stuff made of these materials 

 is between both colors; it is very close, does not fret, is very durable, 

 washes like linen, and, when good, receives no damage by spots, 

 even though oil be spilt on it. Br. Robertson informs us, that the na- 

 ture and productions of the wild silkworms are illustrated at greater 

 length in the large collection of Mersioirst on China, and by Pere de 

 JXiailla, in his voluminous history of China.| It must have been these 

 worms to which Virgil jeferred: 



Velleraque utfcllisdcpectant tennia seres. — Georg. Ub.u. 121. 



It was to the same species of silk to which Pliny refers, when he 

 mentions " the stuff made from a white dorvny substance, combed by 

 the Seres from the leaves of trees, which differed from the wool-bear- 

 ing trees (cotton) of the Island of Tylos in the Persian gulf" 



Don Luis Nee observed on certain trees growing in Chilpancingo, 

 Tixtala, &c., in South America, ovate nests of caterpillars, eight 

 inches long, which the inhabitanis manufacture into stockings and, 

 handkerchiefs.§i Great numbers of similar nests, of a dense tissue, 

 resembling Chinese paper, of a brilliant whiteness, and formed of dis- 

 tinct and separable layers, the interior being the thinnest, and very 

 transparent, were observed by Humboldt, in the province of Mechoa- 

 can, and the mountains of Santarosa, at a height of 10,500 feet above, 

 the level of the sea, upon various trees. || The silk of these nests^ 

 which are the work of social caterpillars, was an object of commerce, 

 even in the time of Montezuma; and the ancient Mexicans pasted to- 

 gether the interior layers, which may be written upon without prepa- 



* History of China, vol. 2d, p. 359, Lond. 1741. 



f Histoire des Sciences, les Arts, &c. des Chinois, torn. 2d, p. 575, &c. 



I Tom. 13, p. 434, Robertson's d'sqiiis;t;')n concernin,e^ ancient In 11a, note 33. 

 Mr. Dclalauze, the author of the essay on silkworms, in t!ie " Cours d'Agricnlture," 

 by Rosier, mentions these Chinese worms, on the authority of Vladum Lottin, who 

 published a treatise on silkworms in Paris, in the year 1757; but takes no notice of 

 Du Halde, although his history of China was published in France nearly twenty years 

 before. 



§ Annals of Botany, 2d, p. 104. 



It Pohtical Essay on New Spain, vol. 3d, p. 59. They were 7 to 7i inches lone by 

 ^l^road. 



6 



