SILK GROWER'S MANUAL. 235 



a part of the education of young ladies. In their schools, 

 convents, or academies, they are to receive a small lot 

 of silkworms' eggs, and they have to hatch them and 

 raise the worms. Those that know all about it show 

 the others. Thus they are educated and familiarized 

 with the treatment and the culture of silkworms, which 

 may prove afterwards very useful to them. 



9th. Aged persons, no more fit for hard labor, men 

 and women, will find in the culture of silk an agreeable 

 and profitable employment. 



10th. I have many, questions asked me on the sub- 

 ject, by letters. Some ask how many trees are required 

 to the acre. To those I would say, that in the way they 

 have to be planted, as I have indicated for the plantation, 

 an acre will take from six to eight hundred, according to 

 the distance you plant them to suit your soil. 



llth. Others ask how long they will have to wait 

 before the trees will give leaves in sufficient quantity to 

 begin to feed the worms. We are in a country so 

 extraordinary for being favorable to the growth of the 

 mulberry trees, that we have not to wait, we can feed 

 in the summer from trees, and even from cuttings 

 planted in winter. This will hardly be believed in 

 other silk countries ; but is a fact here. If your 

 trees or cuttings are planted in good mulberry soil, with 

 some little care, of course, a small quantity of worms 

 can be fed the first year. 



12th. Others ask how many worms can le fed from 

 one acre. This is very hard to tell, as it depends on a 

 great many circumstances : First, on the quality of the 



