ays ZOOLOGY. 



Peloponnesus, and it gave to this part of Greece the modern 

 name of Morea. From thence the mulberry and the silk- 

 worm passed into Sicily, by the care of King Roger, and 

 acquired in Calabria a rapid extension. Some gentlemen who 

 had accompanied Charles the Eighth into Italy during the 

 war of 1494, having discovered all the advantages which 

 that country drew from this branch of agriculture, were 

 desirous of conferring the gift on their native country, and 

 so caused the mulberry to be transplanted from Naples into 

 Provence and Dauphine. It is but thirty years ago when 

 might be seen still at Allan, near Montelimart, the first of 

 these trees which was planted in France. It was brought 

 there by Guy Pope of St; Auban, lord of Auban. At present, 

 the mulberry covers a great part of the south of France, and 

 is cultivated even in the north. 



Silkworms live in the state of a larva about thirty-four 

 days, and during this time change their skin four times; 

 the time comprised between these successive moultings con- 

 stitutes what the agriculturalists call the various ages of 



luxury was censured in the age of Tiberius by the gravest of the Komans. 

 Two hundred years after the age of Pliny, the use of pure, or even of 

 mixed silks was confined to the female sex, and all the opulent citizens of 

 Rome and the provinces were insensibly familiarized with the example of 

 Heliogabalus, the first who, by this effeminate habit, had sullied the dignity 

 of an emperor and a man. Aurelian complained that a pound of silk was 

 sold at Rome for twelve ounces of gold ; but the supply increased with the 

 demand, and the price diminished with the supply. 



" As silk became of indispensable use, the Emperor Justinian saw with con- 

 cern that the Persians had occupied by land and sea the monopoly of this 

 important supply, and that the wealth ot his subjects was continually drained 

 by a nation of enemies and idolaters. An active government would have 

 restored the trade of Egypt and the navigation of the Red Sea, which had 

 decayed with the prosperity of the Empire ; and the Roman vessels might 

 have sailed, for the purchase of silk, to the ports of Ceylon , of Malacca, or 

 even of China. Justinian embraced a more humble expedient, and solicited 

 the aid of his Christian allies, Ethiopians of Abyssinia, who had recently 

 acquired the arts of navigation, the spirit of trade, and the sea-port of 

 Adulis, still decorated with the trophies of a Grecian conqueror. Along the 

 African coast, they penetrated to the Equator in search of gold, emeralds, and 

 aromatics ; but they wisely declined an unequal competition, in which they 

 must be always prevented by the vicinity of the Persians to the markets of 

 India ; and the Emperor submitted to the disappointment, till his wishes 

 were gratified by an unexpected event. The gospel had been preached to the 

 Indians ; a bishop already governed the Christians of St. Thomas, on the 

 pepper coast of Malabar ; a church was planted in Ceylon, and the mission- 

 aries pursued the footsteps of commerce to the extremities of Asia. Two 

 Persian monks had long resided in China, perhaps in the royal city of 

 Nankin, the seat of a monarch addicted to foreign superstitions, and who 

 actually received an embassy from the isle of Ceylon. Amidst their pious 

 occupations, they viewed with a curious eye the common dress of the Chinese, 

 the manufactures of silk, and the myriads of silkworms, whose education, 



