PRODUCE OF LAND, &C. 113 



England, France and China, are sold in this country 

 for sixteen dollars a pound. And, as the cost and fair 

 profit of manufacturing cannot exceed seven dollars, it 

 leaves the enormous profit of nine dollars a pound for 

 the raw silk, which price the Americans are now pay- 

 ing to the people of Italy and France. 



SECTION XXXVIII. 



PRODUCE OF LAND, OF LABOR, AND OF SILK. 



I have stated that Mr. Duponceau raised in the city 

 of Philadelphia seven ounces of eggs with the labor of 

 two persons, and those not fully employed, except the 

 last ten days, and some occasional help, who were em- 

 ployed to bring the leaves from the country, two miles 

 distant. Such is the statement of Mr. Cobb. G. B. 

 Smith, Esq., a gentleman practically acquainted with 

 the business, and one on whom we may rely, has as- 

 sured us, in his publications, that " the labor required 

 to attend 1,000,000 silk-worms would be, the first week, 

 two persons; for the second, four; for the third, eight; 

 for the remaining two, fifteen or twenty." Most of 

 these may be girls, boys or aged women. The aggre- 

 gate amount at the most, according to this estimate, will 

 be but 378 days of individual labor. 



In Connecticut a child of from nine to twelve years 

 of age, will gather seventy-five pounds of leaves in a 

 day, this being called a day's work in that State, where 

 the trees are usually large and difficult of access; and it 

 is also stated that there, one hundred pounds of leaves 

 will produce one pound of reeled silk. And a child in 

 six weeks, or thirty-six working days, will gather at this 

 rate, sufficient for twenty-seven pounds of reeled silk. 

 It will readily occur that from low plantations of trees, 



