SOLON ROBINSON, 1845 525 



capita is so great that they never can be induced to think 

 they are able. 



Whether our children will be willing to pay our debts, 

 I am sure I cannot tell. If they are, it will appear just 

 as remarkable to me, and no more so, as it would to see 

 the present generation willing to pay them. 



I am sorry to write thus of my own State, but I must 

 write what I honestly believe or hold my tongue. And 

 no honest Indianian who would do as he would be done 

 by ought to do that, nothwithstanding he may expect to 

 hear the whole pack of old dogs — white dogs, and blue 

 dogs, puppies and all, let loose upon him. 



That they may know who to bark at, I give my name. 



Solon Robinson, 



New-York, Oct. 7 of Lake Co " Ia " 



Address before National Convention 

 of Farmers and Silk Culturists. 



[Baltimore American Farmer, 3d series, 1:138-39; Nov., 1845 1 ] 



[October 11?, 1845] 

 To the Friends of Improvement in the Science of Agricul- 

 ture, Horticulture, and Silk Culture 2 in the U. States: 

 The Convention of Delegates representing these impor- 

 tant interests, now holding their third annual meeting 

 under the call of the American Institute of New York, 3 



'Reprinted in Southern Cultivator, Augusta, Georgia, 5:4-5 

 (January, 1847), and as Appendix 39, Annual Report of the Com- 

 missioner of Patents, 1845, pp. 1169-71. 



a Repeated attempts have been made since the beginning of the 

 Colonial period to establish the production of raw silk in the 

 United States upon a paying basis. At times there has been wide- 

 spread interest in the subject, as for example during the so-called 

 silk craze prior to 1860. High cost of labor in the North, and in- 

 ability to train negroes in the South to successfully perform the 

 delicate tasks involved in the culture of silk, explain in part why 

 the industry has continued to languish. 



8 An organization founded in 1828 for the promotion, by exhibi- 

 tions and fairs, of agricultural, commercial, manufacturing, and 

 artistic interests throughout the United States. It is now divided 



