ADVERTISEMENT 



OF 



THE TRANSLATOR 



A STRANGER to the serigeue* industry, and to the science of 

 Agriculture, it does not belong to me, above all, after the Introduc- 

 tion of M. Carnille Beauvais, to speak of the practical advantages 

 which the Chinese work offers, and of which I now publish the 

 translation. 



I will only present to the reader some details, purely literary, of 

 which, some will not, perhaps, be uninteresting. The Chinese, whose 



* To characterize the industry which takes its source in the work on silk worms, 

 many epithets have been created in latter days, derived from the Greek or Latin, 

 of which the inaccuracy was the least defect. Mr. Henry Bourdon, has substituted 

 for it, with cause, the word sericifere (which produces the silk.) Without finding 

 fault with the expression made use of by this learned young man, I take the liberty 

 of proposing, in my turn, the epithet strigene, (produced by the silk worms.) It 

 is more concise, and can qualify with sufficient justice the industry, which is 

 the object of this translation. In fact, the Greek word, 2*j/> (ser) signifies the 

 caterpillar which produces the silk. y,p* crxwX*?! ysvvZv TO (rnptxov : Vermis qui 

 producit sericum jilum. (Greek Dictionary of Hesychius, page 1176.) The plural 

 2 ?/>$ is found in the same sense in the letters of the Emperor Julian, (Epist. 24 \ 

 O< TTepa-ixoi (Typis : Persici bombyces sen vermesqui sericafila nent. (See the great 

 Dictionary by Henry Estienne, London edition, the word E^p?$.) 



The termination gene, signifies born of, begot, produced by. It derives this 

 meaning from the Greek yevyg (in the compound adjectives.) I will quote here 

 the example A^o-yei/yjs O^va-o-sv?, Ulysses born of Jupiter, (Homer's Odyssey, 

 book v, verse 203.) Thus, from the Greek etymology the expression of the 

 industrious se'rigene signifies exactly the industry resulting from the silk worms, 

 produced by the (work of the) silk worms. 



