have scarcely ever seen an instance in which 

 the truth of the position was not fully estab- 

 lished. 



At Economy, Pennsylvania, near Pitts- 

 burgh, the culture in all its branches, from 

 the feeding of the worm to the manufacture oJ 

 the silk is extensively carried on by those 

 worthy gentlemen and public spirited men, 

 the Messrs. Rapp, and we have seen specimens 

 of the silk wove there, which were no less 

 beautiful to the eye than elastic in quality. 



Mr. Joseph Ripka of Philadelphia has a 

 flourishing plantation containing ten acres of 

 Mulberry trees on the Point-no-Point road, 

 and intends entering into the silk culture on a 

 large scale; and a Mr. Upton, also of Phila- 

 delphia, has been engaged in the silk manu- 

 facture, but to what extent we are unable to 

 say. 



In Maryland the culture of the Mulberry 

 and silk worm has for many years been con- 

 ducted on a small scale by individuals. We 

 have seen many specimens of fine sewing silk, 

 and have been informed that several ladies in 

 the lower part of this state on the Western 

 Shore, as well as others on the Eastern, have 

 succeeded in fabricating very pretty speci- 

 mens of silk cloth. Among those in our own 

 city who have taken a lead in this business, 

 we should not omit to mention the names of 

 Mrs. Kesiah Norris, Mrs. Flax, Mr. Wm. 

 B. Buchanan, Mr. Gideon B. Smith and Mr. 

 J. Y. Tompkins. The three latter individuals 

 have largely contributed by their intelligent 

 and praiseworthy labors, not only to keep 

 alive the spirit of enterprise, but have thrown 

 much light upon the subject. Mrs. Norris 

 too, deserves especial notice, being of late 

 years, perhaps the first one to engage in it in 

 this quarter ; and had she not been cut off in 

 the midst of her usefulness, we have no doubt 

 she would long ere this have brought the manu- 

 facture to perfection. Some years before her 

 death she and her husband had settled upon a 

 small estate near Baltimore, and commenced a 

 plantation of the Mulberry, with the view of 

 carrying on the business, and just as those 

 trees were beginning to yield food for her 

 worms, she was stricken to the earth. It does 

 not appear that any one else in Maryland, so 

 far as our researches have gone, ever under- 

 took it as a branch of husbandry, and this is 

 the more to be wondered at, as no state in the 

 Union is more happily situated for conducting 

 it to advantage. Her climate and soil are both 

 peculiarly adapted to the culture of the Mul- 

 berry ; she has a great proportion of light, 



sandy, gravelly and dry .lands, which years of 

 exhausting culture have rendered almost use- 

 less for other agricultural purposes, that could 

 be profitably occupied in this culture. These 

 circumstances would seem to point out with 

 unerring certainty the policy of entering into 

 the silk culture, not only to Maryland, but to 

 every other state in the Union similarly situa- 

 ted, and without intending or wishing to be un- 

 derstood as being invidious, we might mention 

 as kindred states, New Jersey, Delaware, 

 Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina and South 

 Carolina, as well as parts of Georgia. 



In Connecticut, attention to the culture of 

 silk commenced about the year 1760, by the 

 introduction of the White Mulberry tree and 

 eggs of the silk worms, into the county of 

 Windham and town of Mansfield, from Long 

 Island, New York, by that patriotic citizen 

 and enterprising agriculturist to whom we 

 have before alluded, Mr. N. Aspinwall, who 

 had there planted a large nursery. He also 

 planted an extensive nursery of the trees 

 in New Haven, and was active in obtaining 

 of the Legislature of the state of Connecticut, 

 an act granting a bounty for planting of the 

 trees. The premium was liberal, being ten 

 shillings for every hundred trees which should 

 be planted, and preserved in thrifty condition 

 for three years, and three pence per ounce for 

 all raw silk which the owners of trees should 

 produce from cocoons of their own raising 

 within the state. After the necessity of a 

 bounty upon trees had ceased, one was 

 granted on raw silk manufactured within the 

 state. An old statute continues in force, which 

 requires skeins of sewing silk to consist of 

 twenty threads each two yards long. 



It may not be amiss here to mention as an 

 act of justice, that in England the most intense 

 anxiety existed to further the culture of silk 

 n this country, nor was this praiseworthy so- 

 icitation confined to the King or his ministers; 

 ndividual associations fully participated. The 

 satriotic society in London for the promotion 

 of arts, #c. paid several hundred pounds ster- 

 ing between the years 1755 and 1772, for 

 Dremiums for planting Mulberry trees, and for 

 cocoons and raw silk made, to various per- 

 sons in Georgia, South Carolina and Connec- 

 ticut. 



After the war of the revolution, the business 

 of the silk culture was renewed and gradually 

 xtended; and it is recorded that in the year 

 1789, 200 Ibs. of raw silk were made in the 

 town of Mansfield, in Windham county, Con- 

 necticut. In 1810, the value of the sewing 



