260 [Senate 



*'it is too small a business," too much trouble, or too long to get the 

 return. There are but few in this country who look upon the silk 

 business as any business at all; but few who would have anything to 

 do with it, and those are, to their praise be it said, entirely ladies. 

 My own opinion is, that it is to us of the south, the greatest business 

 that has ever presented itself. An old negro competent to feed young 

 children or chickens, with the aid of a few small chaps, from 4 to 8 

 years of age, can make as much as grown hands can in the field, and 

 without any expense of gin-house or machinery — in fact, at an ex- 

 pense of a few hundred feet of lumber, a workman can soon fix up 

 the unoccupied portion of the gin-house (generally 40 by 60 feet,) 

 with hurdles, &c.,and thus make it a cocoonery when not used for 

 cotton, it being only used for that purpose from the middle of 

 August to January or February. I could, without any building, open 

 a cocoonery 62 feet long, and some 20 feet above the earth — the ga- 

 ble of my gin-house. The hurdles, &c., could be packed out of the 

 way in summer time. [Gill's tent and cradle better. — J. R. B.J 



It seems to me to be a business peculiarly appropriate for the 

 south. We can commence feeding the 20th of April (this year 16th, 

 last year 24th). We can feed without taking our field hands, with- 

 out any extra building; and all done thus, is entire gain. 



D. H. Sajbin, Wellingfordj Rutland Co., Vt. — I am but little ac- 

 quainted with raising, or manufacturing silk, having but just com- 

 menced in the business, and that on a small scale as yet, and my ob- 

 ject in this communication is to obtain information, not that I think 

 of giving it. 



I now have about three acres of trees, about half of which are the 

 white, or Italian, the others the Alpine, one acre of which are set in 

 hedge form, the other for standard trees, from which I have fed 

 worms the present season that have procured me 80 lbs. cocoons, 

 from which I have reeled 6 lbs. raw silk, and have saved about 1 lb. 

 eggs, mostly of the peanut. The worms were fed in an open build- 

 ing, so much open that the wind would frequently blow '.he I'.aves 

 from the shelves, where the worms were feeding, but still I do not 

 think I lost one in a hundred of what moulted the first time. There 

 was no disease among them. 



The leaves to feed them were all picked by two children, one 11 

 and the other 12 years of age, during the last stage before winding. 

 I think the bounty paid by our State well pays all expenses, with 

 those who manage it right. But here is the fact. I am fully per- 

 suaded (at least so long as this bounty is continued), that five acres 

 of trees of the age of mine (4 years from the seed), will produce 

 more nett profit than can now be realized from 200 sheep, or from a 

 dairy of 20 cows; and I trust the time is not far distant when the 

 raising of silk in the United States will be considered as profitable a 

 business as that of raising wool. I am of opinion that all that is re- 



