1839] 



FARMERS' REGISTER 



137 



earliest is the 2-k!i of April, and ihe latest Ihe 15th 

 of May. If the leaves are not ready, he keeps 

 the hatcliiniT baciv, by lodging the grains in a cool 

 cellar. He has known one tree in Languedoc 

 yield 80 livrcs a year in silk. Moulinsand its en- 

 virons make to the value of 60 or 80,000 livres a 

 year. Motis. Marlin sells trees, of two years old, 

 at 20 livres the thousand. The distance of plant- 

 in<x, il" lor crops under the trees, thiriy feet ; i/ no 

 crops, twenty teet. Of the writers that have treat- 

 ed of this subject, he prefers Mons. Sauvages. 



In Ihe particulars of an estate to be sold, was 

 one article relative to the product of silk ; muiber- 

 ries enough for 12 oz. of grain, yielding 60 lb. of 

 eilk. 



VivARAis.* — Maisse to Thuys. — First meet 

 with mulberries in going south ironi Auvergne. 

 They yield very largely here; I am assured, That 

 many trees, in a good year, reach 12 livres each. 

 That in (bur years after planting, they begin to 

 produce leaves enough for stri[)ping. The best of 

 them are all grafted. Trees, fifteen years after 

 planting, have, in a very good year, yielded six 

 livres. I was shewn a small field that yields, one 

 year with another, 120 livres; I stepped, and 

 Ibund it 50 yards by 70 yards, or 3,500 square 

 yards, (£7. 4s. 4d. per English acre) ; yet th:e 

 trees were not regularly planted, nor fully; and 

 this besides the other produce of the ground. 



jiiibenas. — The silk-mills here, which are con- 

 siderable, purchase the cocoons of the farmer, at 

 28 to 32 sous the pound. The mulberry trees here 

 are very large. 



Villcneuve de Bergue. — Twenty quintals of 

 leaves give one quintal of cocoons, and one quin- 

 tal of cocoons 10 lb. of silk. They reckon that 

 the waste, debris and dechet, pay the spinnin-;. 

 Eighteen trees, of seven years age, pay 23 livrcs 

 a year; but some trees, of ten years old, have been 

 known to give 3 livres each. Three-fourths of an 

 arpent dc Paris have been sold lor 400 livrcs; the 

 soil all rock and stone, but calcareous. The trees 

 are grafted before transplantation, which is at three 

 years old ; price, 12 and 15 sous each. The se- 

 cond year alter planting they begin to gather. 

 The price of the leaves 3 livres the 100 lb. ; and 

 of gathering 10 sous the quintal. The culture is 

 reckoned more profitable than vines, which are 

 sometimes grubbed up, to make way for mulber- , 

 ries. Of the sorts, the rose feuille is best. In the 

 road to Viviers, I remarked a tree 2^ feet in diam- 

 eter; and very large ones are in the bed of a tor- 

 rent, where no earth (only stones) is visible. 



DAUPHiivK.t — Monielimart. — Silk is the great 

 produce of the country ; they have mills, where 

 the cocoons are bought, at 27 sous the pound. 

 An ounce of grains gives 60 lb. of cocoons, and 

 12 lb. of cocoons 1 lb. of silk : forty middling trees, 

 each yielding a quintal of leaves, being required 

 to feed thai proportion of worms. The grains are 

 hatched by artificial heat, and tl>e operation de- 

 mands wood to the amount of 24 livres to each 

 ounce of grains. A common method of conduct- 

 ing the business is, for the proprietor of the land 



* Vivarais — more south. About midway between 

 the centre and the Mediterranean. 



t Dauphine — in the south-eastern part of France, 

 and in the same latitude with, and adjoining Piedmont 

 in Italy. 



Vol. VII— 18 



to find trees and half the grains, the poor people 

 the other half and all the labor; and the parties 

 divide the produce between them. The imftedi- 

 ments in the culture are, — 1. climate ; frosts in 

 the spring destroy the leaves, and, if at a criti- 

 cal time, there is no remedy. I demanded if 

 they had no succedaneum, in such case, in feed- 

 ing the worms with the leaves of some other 

 plants? The answer was, that experimeiits had 

 been made upon that point, without any success ; 

 that the idea, however, was nonsense, for the 

 quantity of food was so great, as to render it ab- 

 surd to think of providing it, not for a certain want, 

 but merely a contingent one ; the expense of such 

 a conduct would absorb all the profit. Nor is it 

 frosts only that are dreaded; great and sudden 

 heats make the worms fail, and they labor very 

 I)oorly. 2. The extreme labor of attending the 

 worms, is a ijreat objection to the business ; it is, 

 lor the last fifteen days, so severe as to kill many; 

 and, for the last eight days, they are cleaned every 

 day. 



Upon a comparison of the culture of the olive 

 and the mulberry, it was remarked to me, that one 

 great advantage of the olive, was the contracted 

 space in which the roots feed, consisting chiefly of 

 a tap-root and fibres, which made the crops sown 

 under them good ; but a mulberry threw out a pro- 

 lusion of roots, fifteen or twenty feet around in 

 every direction. 



They have been known, at eleven years growth, 

 to yield 200 lb. of leaves each tree. 



The mulberry is found not to like water; for 

 there is in the watered meadows a mound of earth, 

 1» keep the water from the roots of these trees. 



When silk-worms are ready to spin the cocoon, 

 if they are cut in halves and thrown into vinegar, 

 each worm gives two transparent ligaments, very 

 strong, for making fishing lines, &c. &o. 



Loriol. — Mons. L'Abbe Berenger, cure of ibis 

 place, has given an uncommon attention to this 

 culture ; he was so obliging as to give me the re- 

 sult of many years' experience on this interesting 

 subject. 



Time of sowing. — There are two seasons ; the 

 first, with the fi'uit, fresh, at the end of June — the 

 second in May, with the seed of last year, dry ; 

 and this is better, because the June sowing suf- 

 fers sometimes, if frosts are severe, or the weather 

 is both cold and humid. When sown dry, if too 

 early, and cold weather succeeds, they are apt to 

 fail. They are often watered. 



Transplantation .—In April following, those that 

 were sown in May arc transplanted, three leet eve- 

 ry way, into the nursery ; only half the plants (the 

 best) being drawn, the rest are left till the year af- 

 ter. They are never transplanted a second time. 



Sort. — The Jeueille rose, with white or grey 

 fruit, is the best ; black fruit not known here, but 

 said to he good for leafing late, and escaping frosts 

 in the spring. 



Grafting. — It is best to graft, in the nursery, in 

 May, when they are three y^ears old, at the head, 

 with grafts cut" in February preceding, and pre- 

 served in sand in a cellar: these grafts are branch- 

 es three fiiet long, which are buried in sand, except 

 lour inches at the end, for three or four knots 

 to shoot ; if all are buried in the sand, all the knots 

 will shoot. At grafting cut off those knots that 

 have shot out, and use the rest. The time is after 

 gathering the leaves of tlie standard to be grafted, 



