FARMERS' REGISTER— ENTOMOLOGY. 



411 



The weight of leaves consumed and wasted, was 

 75 lbs. 



After I had found the quantity of leaves the 1500 

 worms consumed, I made a comparison with a sta- 

 tistical table communicated in a letter to tlie 20tli 

 Congress of the United States, by Dr. James 

 Mease, on the method of rearing silk in Bavaria, 

 and found by this table 20,000 silk worms con- 

 sumed 1000 lbs. mulberry leaves — exactly corres- 

 ponding to 75 lbs. for every 1500 worms — and that 

 from 7 to 10 pounds of cocoons make a pound of 

 raw or reeled silk — from this estimate the product 

 of my experiment nearly coincides, for 4 lbs. and 

 5 oz. produced 7| ounces ot silk. Nor does this 

 estimate of consumption of leaves and the product 

 of silk, materially dilfer from the estimate and 

 exact result of Count Dandolo — transmitted to 

 Congress by the Hon. Richard Rush, then Secre- 

 tary of State. 



It will readily be perceived that the rearing of 

 silk worms in our state is practicable, and with due 

 management equals the product raised in Bavaria, 

 and the careful management in the extensive labo- 

 ratory of Count Dandolo, where eight ounces of 

 eggs, or 160,000 worms are reared. In this labo- 

 ratory the leaves are chopped, the thermometer 

 regulates the temperature, and the hygrometer the 

 dampness of the atmosphere ; and every measure 

 of precaution used to secure the worms from dis- 

 ease — by ventilation, by stoves, and by cleanliness. 

 On reading these treatises, and observing all the 

 nice directions contained therein, any person would 

 almost shrink from the task, and become discour- 

 aged before they attempted to enter a field where 

 so many obstacles seemed to threaten him. I have 

 chopped no leaves — made no fire but once or twice, 

 and tlien when the weather was extremely cold 

 and damp for the season. I gave them what they 

 would eat, and they appeared to know what to do 

 with the leaves as well as any other insect, and not 

 more at a loss about it. 



I am fully of opinion that the culture of silk is 

 as easily learned as any other kind of business or 

 art — and that many families in every town would 

 find as profitable reward for their labor as our rich 

 farmers do, by correspondent care and exertion. 



ELIAS FROST. 



Plainfield, j^ugust 27, 1883. 



VALUE OF THE STUDY OF EXTOMOLOGY TO 

 AGRICULTURE. 



Extract from an address delivered by the Rev. J. 

 Brachman, before the Horticultural Society of 

 Charleston. 



From the Souihsrn Agriculuirist. 



Entomology too. a science but little known till 

 very recently, lays weighty claims to the attention 

 of the horticulturist. Wherever we go, we find 

 the earth, the trees, the shrubs, and the air filled 

 with thousands of living beings, assuming the most 

 wonderful changes, and gifted with the most sur- 

 prising instincts. Some of these, like the silk- 

 worm, the cochineal, and the cantharides, add to 

 the wealth or luxury of man, or minister relief to 

 his disease^ Others are destructive of his pros- 

 pects, and the enemies of his repose. Some at- 

 tack the roots of his trees and plants which soon 

 wither and die, whilst others fasten upon the blos- 

 soms, or upon the fruit, and all his bright hopes 



are blighted. The fair one who has raised with 

 care and perseverance some favorite plant, finds it 

 drooping and decaying in spite of all her vigilance, 

 and is not aware that a worm may be at its root, 

 or that some insect may visit it at night and de- 

 prive it of its buds and leaves ; but she knows not 

 the characters of either — she knows not where its 

 eggs are deposited, at what season of the year she 

 may apprehend its attacks, and is utterly unable 

 to guard against it. 



When the insect called the Hessian fly made its 

 appearance on Long-Island in 1776, it was wrongly 

 conjectured that the Hessian soldiers, under the 

 pay of the British government, had conveyed this 

 evil along with them from Germany. The British 

 government feared that it might be introduced into 

 England, and took measures to prevent it. Infor- 

 mation was sought by government from practical 

 men in America, some of whom had lost their en- 

 tire crop by tlie insect; and yet they were igno- 

 rant whether it was a moth, a fly, or what they 

 term a bug. Expresses were sent to ambassadors 

 in France, Austria, Prussia and America. The 

 information obtained was so voluminous as to have 

 filled two hundred octavo pages, yet still so little 

 science was possessed by the persons who gave in- 

 formation about the insect, and by those who met 

 to ward off its ravages, that it was impossible to 

 form any idea of its genus or character till Sir Jo- 

 seph Banks, an eminent naturalist, lent his aid in 

 the investigation, and gave the nation the only in- 

 formation that could be relied on. An insect with 

 a somewhat similar character actually made its 

 appearance in England sometime afterwards. It 

 threw the country into great consternation, as 

 they feared that it might prove destructive to the 

 staff of life; when Mr. Marsham, by tracing out 

 the species proved the alarm to be unfounded. 

 Pursuing the history of this insect again in Ame- 

 rica, entomologists discovered its character and 

 habits, and by sowing their wheat at a particular 

 time in autumn, when it was too late for the insect 

 to multiply before the cold weather set in, and 

 when the plants Avould be too much forwarded to 

 sustain much injury in the spring, the cultivators 

 have, in a great measure, arrested its destructive 

 progress, and thus science has lent her aid to agri- 

 culture, in averting evils which at one time threat- 

 ened to banish from our land the culture of the 

 finest grain, with the exception of rice, which is 

 found in the world. 



The utility of entomological knowledge will far- 

 ther appear from a circumstance which occurred 

 in Sweden. The oak timber in the royal dock- 

 yards had been perforated and greatly injured, 

 when the king sent toLinnaeus, the father of natu- 

 ral history, to trace out the causes of the destruc- 

 tion of the timber. He detected the lurking cul- 

 prit under the form of a beetle, ( Lymexylon no- 

 vate,) and by directing the timber to be immersed 

 during the time of the metamorphosis of that 

 insect, furnislied a remedy which secured it from 

 its future attacks. Another instance, which oc- 

 curred among the elm trees in St. James' Park, 

 London, between the years 1820 and 1824, is re- 

 corded. These trees suddenly became affected in 

 a very singular manner. The bark fell from the 

 stem and whole rows died. There happened to be 

 a compan)' of soldiers stationed in the Park, and as 

 the trees were barked to about the height of the 

 soldier's bayonet, the suspicion fell on some unfor- 



