LRPIDOPTERA. 23 1 



soon as the worms are hatched, the eggs are covered with net, and 

 over this are placed mulberry boughs, covered with tender leaves, on 

 which all the little worms congregate. They are then lifted up with a 

 hook made of thin wire, and the worms are placed on a table covered 

 with paper, leaving a proper space between each. They are given, as 

 their first meal, tender leaves cut into little pieces with a knife. These 

 are the operations gone through for the two raisings of worms on the 

 second and third day of the hatching. During this first age they give 

 them from six to eight meals a day, taking care to distribute their 

 food to them as equally as possible. The first meal is given at five 

 o'clock in the morning ; the last at eleven or twelve o'clock at night. 



When the moult is approaching, the young ones are made to climb 

 on to boughs having tender leaves, so that they can be moved to 

 litters as thin and clean as possible, and there sleep in a good state 

 of health. When the mass of worms is well awake again, the next 

 thing to do is to take them off the litter on which they moulted, and 

 to give them food. If this problem were proposed to a person strange 

 to the operation which is now occupying our attention — to separate 

 the worms from the faded and withered food upon which they are 

 reposing, without touching them — he would certainly be very much at 

 a loss what to answer. The solution of this problem presented for 

 long time great difficulties, and occasioned numerous reverses in 

 the rearing. Now-a-days, thanks to the employment of a net, the 

 delitemeftt, or taking them off their bed, has become an easy operation. 



Over the worms, placed on a table, is spread a net, the meshes 

 of which are broad enough to allow them to pass through. On this 

 net are spread the leaves which are to compose a meal. The worms 

 at once leave the old food, and get on to the new leaves. Attendants 

 then lift the litter with the worms, and throw away the old leaves, 

 now unoccupied, clean the table, and replace the net with the 

 worms. At the next delitement the first net is found under the litter. 

 Figs. 211 and 212 show two forms of these nets made of thread. 



Thread nets, which were of great use, have been supplanted 

 with great advantage by paper ones, which were invented by 

 M. Eugene Robert. These are leaves of paper, of a peculiar 

 manufacture, pierced with holes proportioned to the size of the 

 worms which are to pass through them. The paper net can be used 

 advantageously also for separating the worms that are too near 

 together, or, as they say, for the dedoublement. Formerly, the 

 delitement and the dedoublement were done by hand — a tedious work, 

 and one that presented serious disadvantages. Now-a-days, as we 

 have seen, the worms themselves perform these two perilous operations. 



