316 



NEW ENGL.4ND FARMER, 



APRIL 10. issg. 



SERICICU LTURE, 



Mr Breck — I enclose a translation of an article 

 from the Propagateur, ofRodez, on a disease whicli 

 prevails in France among sillj-worms, called tlie 

 Muscardine, and another in relation to t!ie movable 

 tables, for magnaneries, invented by Mr Vasseur, 

 which is considered a very import;int addition to 

 those establishments. I regret that there was not 

 a descri)*tion of the tables given, for it may be very 

 desirable to adopt them in this country. The dis- 

 covery was first made known, and its advantages 

 tested, la^t summer ; but so ample is the testimony 

 in their favor, that there does not appear to be a 

 doubt, as to the great benefit, which lias thus been 

 conferred upon the cultivators of silk. I have writ- 

 ten to a gentleman in Paris, to obtain and transmit 

 to me, a particular description of the movable tables, 

 and shall hasten to communicate the information I 

 may receive. 



The culture of the mulberry tree and the rear- 

 ing of silk worms having excited unusual attention 

 in France and Italy, within a few years ; numerous 

 works have been published on those subjects, and 

 the authors have found it convenient to adopt the 

 appropriate and expressive term of Sericiculture, as 

 including whatever relates to both of tlie branches 

 of that rural industry. It is derived from Sericum. 

 The ancients being ignorant of the exact mode in 

 which silk was produced, and having received it 

 from the Sa-es, a people who inhabited that indefin- 

 ite portion of Scythia, whicli they called Serica, 

 but which is now known as China, the Romans 

 gave the name of Sericum to that precious mate- 

 rial. 



This word having been used in the articles 

 translated from the Propagateur and which appear- 

 ed in the Farmer of the 27th ult. as well as in 

 those which are annexed, the above explanation has 

 been deemed necessary. 

 Very respectfully, 



Your most ob't serv't, 



H. A, S. DRARBORN. 



H-nothrrn Cottage, \ 

 Roxbury, March 29, 1839. ] 



THE SILK WORM. 

 The contagious disease called the Muscardine, exam- 

 ined by Mr .iudouin of the Institute. 



The short visit which Mr Audouin recently made 

 to our city, has been beneficial to the amateurs of 

 natural history, and still more so to agriculturalists, 

 to whom he has given information, as to the best 

 means to be employed to prevent the ravages to 

 their grape vines by the Fyrnlis. This learned 

 professor, who has devoted his attention to insects 

 which are injurious to agriculture, has made the 

 most curious researches in relation to a contagious 

 disease, which frequently occasions the destruction 

 of all the silk worms in a magnanery. The cul- 

 ture' of the latter being a recent branch of indus- 

 try, , in our department, and where it is destined to 

 advance, we shall endeavor to give an analysis ol 

 the ingenious experiments, which have been under- 

 taken by Mr Audouin, for discovering a fact in 

 natural history, which is not only very curious, but 

 fertile in the most important results to those, wno 

 are engaged in rearing silk worms. 



There exists a disease called Muscardine, which 

 successively attacks all the silk worms in a raao-- 

 nanery, and is transmitted from one to another. 

 The nature of this disease, its development and 

 propagation, has long been a mystery, which it has 



often been attempted to solve, but the veil has now- 

 been rent, as will be perceived by relating the 

 experiments made by Mr Audouin. 



What is the nature or real cause of the disease 

 called the Muscardine? 



The cause is the development of a vegetable 

 wliich establishes itself as a parasite, in the sub- 

 cutaneous tissue of tho worm, and occasions its 

 death in a few days, when the numerous filaments 

 which it sends out,'have filled and interlaced, with 

 an inextricable net-work, all the oleaginous tissue 

 of the insect. 



What can lie more astonishing than this vegeta- 

 ble, which is produced at the expense of an animat- 

 ed, living body, and ultimately perishes by causing 

 the death of that very body in which it grows. It 

 is an entirely new species, and appears to be placed 

 in some manner, between the animal and vegetable 

 realms. 



This plant, which is of the-genus botrytes (cryp- 

 togamia) is developed in the oleaginous sub-ciita- 

 neous tissue of the silk worm and rapidly extends 

 its radicles, which branch off in a thousand direc- 

 tions. The worm perishes in six or seven days 

 after being inoculated with the disease. The dead 

 worm is, at first, soft and flaccid, soon becomes 

 stitTand is covered with a white mealy dust, which 

 is nothing more than the sporules or seed of the 

 plant, supported by little stems which have pierced 

 the pores of the skin. These sporules or seeds 

 are so many germs of new plants; and being ab- 

 sorbed by the healthy worms, soon develop 

 among them new plants, which is balled the dis- 

 ease. 



Let us come to the proof. Mr Audouin took on 

 the point of a needle some of this white dust, which 

 covered the body of a dead worm, with which he 

 inoculated under the skin, another worm, as well 

 as a chrysalis and a perfect winged insect, each of 

 which in their turn, were covered with this white 

 dust, being tlie fructification of the plant with which 

 they had been inoculated. 



This cryptogamia does not grow after the death 

 of the insect, but only during its life, and causes 

 the death of the insect by the development of its 

 roots; and if this white dust does not always ap- 

 pear after the death of the insect, it is because the 

 vegetable had not acquired sufficient maturity to 

 produce its sporules or seeds. The whole progress 

 of the growth of the vegetable can be seen by the 

 aid of a microscope, in tlie insect which has been 

 inoculated with the muscardine. The nfimerous 

 radicles a.re multiplied from day to day ; the olea- 

 ginous glpbulcs and the trachea gradually disappear 

 t.nd are repla.ce\l by the roots from which rise up, 

 after the deatli of the insect, through the pores of 

 the skin, little stems, and exhibit the sporules in 

 the form of white dust. 



It was not sufficient for Mr Audouin to have 

 proved by repeated inoculations, that the muscar- 

 dine was contagious, and that it was occasioned 

 by the development of a vegetable — he has proved 

 that it can be spontaneously produced, in all pla- 

 ces, when certain circumstances are united to favor 

 its development ; it is thus that the larva of the 

 saperda [Longicornus : the capricornus of Linn.] 

 placed in situations filled with humid moss and sub- 

 mitted to various temperatures, have been sponta- 

 neously infected with muscardine ; from whence 

 he concludes that this disease is not peculiar to 

 silk worms, but can be propagated from the silk 

 worm to other insects, and vice versa ; and that in 

 all these transmissions, the cryptogamia and the 



disease which it produces, undergoes no change. 

 In fact the vegetable can be reproduced, not onlr 

 by sporules, but even in an artificial manner, by- 

 grafting certain parts of it, as its roots for exam- 

 ple, upon the oleaginous tissue, and which extends 

 itself much more rapidly by this mode of infection, 

 and produces a much more sudden death than by 

 the sporules. 



This disease being now so well known, the 

 means for protecting the silk worm from its ravages 

 may be easily provided. First, it is necessary to 

 prevent the atmospheric circumstances which pro- 

 duce it in the magnaneries ; that is to say, a hu- 

 mid temperature, passing alternately from cold to 

 hot ; second, all contact between the Jiealthy and 

 diseased worms is to be avoided ; third, sprinkle 

 with the sulphate of copper the tables, shelves, or 

 whatever else the diseased worms have been 

 contact with — a process which was introduced by 

 Mr Berard of Montpelier ; and be particularly mi- 

 nute in attentions to cleaning. — Extract from the 

 Journal of t'harenle Inferieure. 



L S , 



Member of the Society of Natural Sciences at Rochelle. 



Facts IN rflation to the New Process op 

 Mr Vassrhr, of Charmes, in the Depart- 

 ment OF Ardechk. 



Valence, July 18, 1839. 

 The Agricultural Society of Drome, at a meet- 

 ing on the Iflth of this month, at which the Prefect 

 presided, Mr Vasseur, of Cliarmes, was called upon 

 to present the proofs, of what he had publicly ad- 

 vanced, in relation to the education of silk worms, 

 which was done, and they were so conclusive, that 

 there no longer remains a doubt that the results 

 hitherto considered incredible , which were obtained, 

 was in consequence of the substitution of movable 

 tables. 



The cocoons produced from the eggs of Dau- 

 phine, which required only 132 to make a pound, 

 have yielded in the steam filatures ofMessrs Blan- 

 clion father and sons, in Chomerac, at tlie rate of 

 one pound of silk for ten pounds seven ounces, or 

 1369 cocoons. Those obtained from Italian eggs, 

 173 of which weighed a pound, yielded, in the 

 steam filature of Mr Deniichoux, in Flaniac, a 

 pound of silk from eight pounds two ounces, or 

 1405 cocoons. ,The leaves consumed were in the 

 following proportions : the silk *orms of Dauphine 

 made from 1272 pounds a quintal of cfccoon- ; those 

 of Italy consumed o.ily 1200 pounds of leaves tor 

 a quintal. Mr Vasseur has deposited with the 

 officers of the society, samples of the silk, and let- 

 ters from the able proprietors of the filatures which 

 we have named. 



These results are immense. They establish this 

 fact; that the cultivators of silk have not produced 

 half as much as may be obtained from their mag- 

 naneries. In the steam filatures, about 3000 co- i 

 coons are required for a pound of silk, and Mr Vas- 

 seur has obtained the same quantity from 1369. 

 There is, consequently, a result in favor of the cul- 

 tivation; which shows a gain of half the quantity 

 of leaves, of labor, space, and expenses of all kinds, 

 besides the advantage derived to the proprietors of 

 the filatures, who obtain a more beautiful quality 

 of silk, with a great economy in labor, as 1369 co- 

 coons are reeled in less time tlian is required for 

 3000. This is the principal point of view in which 

 the discovery of the movable tables should be con- 

 sidered, — an invention whicli enables each worm jto 

 produce double the quantity of silk which has hith- 



