A WOMAN'S APPEAL 131 



Authours as have written of the ordering and feeding 

 of Silkworms: that this her invention being thus made 

 known unto you, her beloved friends in Virginia, she 

 is most confident, and assures herself you will all there 

 instantly, without further delay (which will be the joy 

 of her heart) become great and rich Masters of this 

 noble Silk -work to all your unspeakable wealth." 

 With dramatic art, she delays the unfolding of her 

 wonderful secret until the torrent of appetizing sen- 

 tences has roused the curiosity to the highest pitch. 

 Now she is ready, and the reader is eager : " In the 

 beginning of May last 1652, when her young Mulberry- 

 tree in her Garden began to put out its buds, then her 

 Silkworm -eggs began to hatch, as the nature of this 

 wise creature is, when her food begins once to appear, 

 she conies forth of her shell : she presently laying a 

 Mulberry- leaf e upon these little crawling creatures, they 

 came all upon it instantly ; then she carried the leaf 

 and them upon it to the tree, upon whose leaves they 

 made hast to be ; and there they day and night fed 

 themselves, creeping from leafe to leafe, and branch to 

 branch at their own liberties most pleasing to them- 

 selves ; they grew and thrived wonderfully, and sur- 

 passed in largness of body those other wormes she kept 

 in her chamber (she having been many a year a Mistris 

 of Silkworms, and kept them by the Book-rules) this 

 good and prosperous beginning heightened her hopes. 

 The wormes, as their nature is, cast off or slipped out 

 of their skins four severall times, still growing greater 

 and greater to the singular " delight and contents of 

 their Mistris. About 45 dayes thus feeding upon the 

 leaves, they began that rare and glorious work of spin- 

 ning their Silk-bottomes upon the leaves and branches 



