1840.1 SENATE— No. 36. 97 



REPORT 



CULTURE OF SILK 



I. History of the Silk Culture in the United States. — 

 The production of silk in this country has been repeatedly 

 brought before the public ; and presented in various forms as a 

 subject of general interest to the agricultural community. 

 When the state of Georgia was settled, silk and wine were re- 

 commended as particular objects of culture. In Virginia meas- 

 ures were taken as early as 1063 to encourage the general pro- 

 duction of silk ; and the failure to plant mulberry trees at the 

 rate of ten for every hundred acres, was made by the laws a 

 penal offence. In 1760, the society in London for the encour- 

 agement of arts, manufactures, and commerce, offered liberal 

 premiums for the production of silk in Georgia, Pennsylvania, 

 and Connecticut. " The society propose to give for every 

 pound weight of cocoons produced in the Province of Con- 

 necticut in the year 1759, of an hard, weighty, and good sub- 

 stance, wherein one worm only has spun, three pence ; for every 

 pound weight of cocoons of a weaker, lighter, spotted, or bruised 

 quality, though only one worm has spun in them, two pence ; 

 for every pound of cocoons, produced in the same year, where- 

 in two worms are interwoven, one penny. These premiums 

 will be paid on condition that a public filature be established 

 in Connecticut, and that each person bring his or her balls to 

 such public filature." This invitation, says Jared Eliot, in 

 his remarkable essays on Field Husbandry in New England, is 

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