410 APPENDIX. 



thirty days, when they descend to the plantains, and, being gathered, 

 and placed on dry leaves, they form their cocoons. Their cocoons 

 are two inches long, and thick in proportion ; they are not reeled like 

 common silk, but spun like cotton or worsted. The silk is wove into 

 cloth for scarfs, turbans, sashes, &c. In that climate they produce 

 six crops in a year. 50,000 pounds of this silk is annually made in 

 Assam. It may be the same silk-worm as that last described. 



There is another sort of these silk- worms, which produces a fibre 

 of great lustre ; and a fourth kind, very large, the moths measuring 

 ten inches across the wings. 



CHAPTER IV. MULBERRY, (Morus.) 



The mulberry, or morus of the botanists, is a genus comprising 

 many species. It derives its name from Mor, in Celtic, blade. Its 

 origin has been assigned to China, but several species have been 

 found growing in a wild state in America. In cold climates it is a 

 deciduous tree, but an evergreen tree within the tropics. It was 

 cultivated at a very early period of time in Western Asia and in Eu- 

 rope, but only for its fruit. The fruit is a berry of a roundish or ob- 

 long form; of a color varying from white to red or black; its pulp 

 envelops numerous small seeds. 



USES. Most of the varieties of the mulberry are esteemed dessert 

 fruits. When perfectly mature, they are grateful to the taste, and 

 very wholesome ; the sirup is useful in mitigating inflammation of 

 the throat. The juice, when properly fermented, affords a pleasant, 

 vinous wine ; mixed with apples, they afford a delicious beverage 

 called mulberry cider, of a deep red color, like Port wine. 



The wood of the mulberry tree is compact, elastic, and hard, and 

 susceptible of a fine polish ; it is therefore sought after by the uphol- 

 sterer, the carver, and the turner. The strength of the timber ren- 

 ders it valuable to the joiner, and also for building boats : its power 

 of resisting the action of water has been compared to oak. 



The roots of the mulberry tree are of a yellow color, and strike 

 downward; and the tree is extremely long-lived. M. de Saint 

 Fond saw, in 1802, one of Ihe original or parent trees of all the 

 white mulberry trees of France, which the followers of Charles VIII. 

 had brought from Italy, on his invasion of that country in 1494. 

 M. Lachaux had caused this tree to be encompassed by a wall, to 

 evince his respect and veneration, and to serve as a monument to a 

 tree so inestimable. 



Whoever would enter extensively and at once on the cultivation 

 of silk, let them, first of all, bestow their attention on the culture of 

 the abundant supplies of food ; this principal and essential food be- 

 ing no other than the material leaves of the various species of the 

 mulberry tree. Not every kind, however, is equally suitable. Lin- 

 naeus has enumerated seven species of those which were known in 

 his day ; and amongst these there are two species, the Tinctora and 

 fndica, which are not used as the food of the silk-worm. The Tinc- 

 tora is the Fustic of commerce, and is used only as a dye. 



The nourishment which is contained in the mulberry leaf is not 



