48 



shops are superintended by an overseer who is master of 

 the whole business. 



Mr Murray, a European writer, says that he visited an 

 establishment for unwinding the silk at Buffalora on the 

 Milanese frontier. Women were arranged opposite each 

 other and conducted the process ; the cocoons contained 

 in baskets on one side, were thrown by handfuls into caul- 

 drons of water, kept boiling by charcoal fires beneath. 

 Each (by a whisk of peeled birch) collected the threads en 

 masse ; the first confused portions were rejected till the 

 threads unwound regularly, freely passing over the glass 

 rods to prevent the injuries of friction. The first portions, 

 necessarily useless, are separated by the hand. When the 

 thread came off uniformly, the cocoons were raised, sus- 

 pended to the hand by their respective threads, and thus 

 handed over to those on the opposite side, who in their 

 turn threw them into cauldrons of water, the temperature 

 of which was nearly that of blood heat and more than milk 

 warm, thus sustained by a steam pipe. The water was 

 thus kept clean and the silk preserved pure and unsoiled ; 

 from these the threads were finally wound. The pro- 

 prietor informed him that this establishment cost about 

 60,000 francs, or about twelve thousand dollars. 



This was probably Gensoul's apparatus, on which 

 great encomiums have been passed. In this apparatus 

 the water is heated by steam ; but it is expensive and 

 has not yet got into general use even in Europe. 



We in America are not obliged to pursue the same 

 course that is followed in Europe. The ingenuity and 

 intelligence of our community will soon arrange a reeling 

 apparatus by the family fireside ; and that part of the year 

 which cannot be employed in rearing the worms will be 



