THE SILKWOfcM. 305 



Metamorphoses Native places. 



still keep together in a web. On changing this 

 they also change their colour and become black ; 

 and as they have now increased too much in size 

 to live in one society, they separate into compa- 

 nies. In their sixth or last skin they entirely se- 

 parate; and in this state they often make such 

 ravages among the nettles as to leave nothing 

 but the stalks and fibres* Sometimes they are 

 seen so numerous as to cover all the tops, and 

 six or seven inches of the stalks, giving them the 

 appearance of being enveloped in black cloth. 

 About the beginning of June they are arrived at 

 their full growth; when, fastening their tails by 

 a web under the nettle-leaves, or to the stalks, 

 they change into chrysalids. These are at first 

 green, but, in a day or two, they change to a 

 bright gold, or else to a greenish brown colour. 

 They remain thus for about twenty days, when 

 they become butterflies* Some few of this se- 

 cond brood live through the winter, being fre- 

 quently found in a state nearly torpid in that 

 season. 



THE SILKWORM. 



THIS wonderful insect is found in a native 

 state on mulberry-trees in China, and some 

 others of the eastern countries, from whence it 

 was originally introduced into Europe in the 

 reign of the emperor Justinian. It is, however, 

 at this time become, in a commercial view, one 



VOL. vi.~ NO. 46. <2 



