1354- ARBORETUM AND FRUTICETUM. PART III. 



manufactured in the country, from 600,0007. to 700,000/. worth were im- 

 ported annually. In 1719, the first silk mill was erected at Derby. After 

 the failure of James I.'s attempts to establish the silkworms and the 

 mulberry, no effort of any importance seems to have been made for many 

 years ; though several individuals had, at different times, reared the worms, 

 and produced silk. In 1825, however, a company was established, under the 

 name of " The British, Irish, and Colonial Silk Company," with a large capital, 

 and under the direction of the celebrated Count Dandolo, whose treatise on 

 the management of the silkworm, &c., is considered the best work extant on 

 the subject in Italy. This company formed extensive plantations in England and 

 Ireland, particularly near Slough, and near Cork; and Mr. John Heathcoat of 

 Tiverton, Devonshire, one of its most influential members, invented a method of 

 reeling which was attended with the most complete success. The company 

 also formed plantations in Devonshire : but, after numerous trials, it was found 

 that the climate of the British Isles was too humid for the production of useful 

 silk ; and the company was finally broken up, and its plantations destroyed, 

 in 1829. For further details respecting this company, and its operations, 

 see Encyc, ofAgric., 2d edit., p. 1105. The cause of the entire failure of 

 this spirited undertaking, as well as that of James I., will, we think, be found 

 in the following very judicious observations from the Journal d y Agriculture 

 desPays-Bas ; which will show the impracticability of any future attempt to rear 

 silkworms as an article of commerce in Britain, or in any similar climate : 

 " The mulberry tree is found in different climates ; but the juice of the leaves 

 grown in the north is much less suitable for the production of good silk, than 

 that of the leaves of the south. In this respect, mulberry leaves and silk differ 

 as much as wines, according to the climate and soil in which they are pro- 

 duced. In general, every climate and soil that will grow good wheat will 

 produce large succulent mulberry leaves ; but these leaves will, in many cases, 

 be too nutritive ; that is, they will have too much sap, and too much substance 

 and succulency. The wild mulberry, with small leaves, answers better, for such 

 a soil, than the grafted mulberry, with large leaves. A general rule, and one 

 to be depended on, is, that the mulberry, to produce the best silk, requires the 

 same soil and exposure that the vine does to produce the best wine. Expe- 

 rience has proved that silkworms nourished by leaves gathered from a dry 

 soil succeed much better, produce more cocoons, and are less subject to those 

 diseases which destroy them, than those which have been nourished by leaves 

 produced by an extremely rich soil." (See Gard. Mag., vol. iv. p. 52.) The 

 silkworm was introduced into America by James I. ; who, at the same time 

 that he published his edict for the planting of the mulberry tree in England, 

 sent over mulberry trees and silkworms to Virginia, accompanied by a book of 

 instructions for their culture, and exhortations to the inhabitants to pursue it 

 instead of that of tobacco. The worms thus introduced were partially culti- 

 vated ; but, not being so lucrative as tobacco, rice, and indigo, they made but 

 small progress till the time of Dr. Franklin. That truly great man established 

 a silk manufactory at Philadelphia, which was put a stop to by the war of 

 independence. Silk has still continued to be raised in some remote parts of 

 the country; but it is only since about 1825 that any establishments have 

 been formed on a large scale. It is now produced extensively through all the 

 southern provinces of the United States; and it seems probable, from the heat 

 and dryness of the American summers, that it will equal the silk of Italy. 

 Since the introduction of M. a. multicaulis into America, which took place in 

 1831, an attempt has been made to obtain two crops in one year, which, it is 

 said, is attended with every prospect of success. The same may be observed 

 of the culture of silk in South America, in which it has been commenced at 

 llio Janeiro, the Caraccas, Buenos Ayres, and other places. 



In India, the culture of the mulberry and the silkworm continues to be 

 practised ; but how far it will be promoted or retarded by the progress of this 

 culture in Europe and America remains to be proved. It appears probable, 

 however, from the superior climate of Eastern Asia, that, when general com- 



