AND HORTICULTUIIAL REGISTER. 



^ 



voii. X vin.i 



PU1!L[SHED BY JOSEPH BRECK & CO., NO 52 NOllTH MARKET bTREET, (Aghicultural Warehoube.) 

 BOSTON, WEDNESDAY EVENING, MAY 6, 1840. 



[N0.44- 



M. E . FARMER. 



For the New England Parmer. 



ESSAY ON THE SILK CULTURE, 

 Jlnd J\i'ew System of France and of Eastern .9si(t. 



Silk is destined to become ere long, one of onr 

 most important agricnitnral productions. The 

 great interests of our country and, its peculiar situ- 

 ation and circumstances, demand the change. Our 

 immense importations of iron, of wine, of silk, aiid 

 of manufactures, so far exceeding all our e.xports, 

 have inflicted upon the country a large foreign 

 debt; this being one of the main causes of all our 

 troubles, and of the ooritinnal recurrence of disas- 

 trous times. 



Hitherto the silk culture has been earnestly re- 

 commended by ma;i/ ii its strenuous fc lends, but 

 • only and exclusively a-s a profitable domestic occu- 

 pation, and only on a auiali scale. I shall endeavor 

 to prove by authentic testimony and conclusive evi- 

 dence, Uiat the silk culture, Kke most other agricul- 

 tural operations, may also be carried on in large 

 establishment.-^, and on a great scale, with far su- 

 perior proHts. 



One of the most celebrated of the English wri- 

 ters on the useful arts and manufactures, is Dr An- 

 drew Ure ; and on agriculture, one of the most dis- 

 tinguished is M. Puvis, president of the agricultural 

 society of A in, in France. The subject of silk 

 having been fully investigated by both, both v.-n- 

 terd being especially of the latest day, 'jii.. joth 

 having in their remarks a particular reference to 

 France, iii a great part of that country, the soil 

 and climate being favorable, both authorities con- 

 cur in stating, that the planting? of the mulberry 

 trees and tlie raising of silk worms, are in this day 

 the most profitable of all agiicultural [lursuits. 



During the last ten years we have imported more 

 than ,$41,000,000 of wines, ,$118,000,000 of silks, 

 and $84,000,000 of iron. In all ,f-243,000,000, and 

 all for articles which may be produced in abun- 

 dance from our own soil. 



Our excessive importations impoverish the coun- 

 try» In 1839 our exports of domestic productions 

 were but $97,000,000, while our imports from for- 

 eign countries were over $170,000,000. Of this 

 amount about ,$,'10,000,000 may bo exported, leav- 

 ing a balance of over $44,000,000, to be pai-J fur 

 in gold and silver. 



It is the policy of Britain to raise, to make, and 

 to sell all they possibly can to other nations; uliile 

 from those other nations they will receive nothing 

 in return which they themselves can either make or 

 produce ; all these being excluded from their ports, 

 either by heavy duties or by prohibitions. 'i'hus 

 while we receive nothing from them wliich wo can- 

 not ourselves either make or produce by our own 

 industry, and from our own soil, they will purchase 

 little or nothing else from us i:i return, except only 

 our cotton, our silver and our gold. This policy of 

 theirs, while it enriches them, imjjpverishes us, and 

 should be resisted on our part by remonstrance, or 

 by the laws of retaliation, as opposed to those first 



principles of reciprocal and "equal rights and free 

 trade," for which we so earnestly and justly con- 

 tend. 



In England, first of all countries for its agri- 

 culture, yet owing to the coldness and humidity of 

 their climate, they cannot raise silk, how ranchso- 

 ever they consume. In Europe, they usually lose 

 from 35 to 60 per cent, of their silkworms, while in 

 China they often lose not one in a hundred. In 

 America it is the same, and from the san)e causes. 



China, the native country of the silkworm, pos- 

 sesses a peculiar climate and country — a perfect 

 parallel to which is to be found in no other country 

 but our own. The French missionaries who had 

 resided previously in America, have borne testimo- 

 ny to this striking similitude and important fact at 

 a very early day. The geographical position of 

 both and of each country i.s similar and alike ; each 

 having its own vnst ocean on the east. By these 

 extraordinary circumstances and this remarkable 

 coincidence, is the climate of each country modified 

 and controlled. In the middle latitudes of these 

 countries, the prevailing winds for a considerable 

 part of the year being from the west and northwest, 

 and coming over a great extent of land, are dry and 

 salubrious : they always bring fair weather, and 

 delightful and bright sunny days. These winds 

 are the counter currents of those trade winds which 

 blow so continually and in the contrary direction 

 within the tropics. 



In Europe, this peculiarly favorable position is 

 reversed ; the climate of that country being modi- 

 fied and controlled liy on ocean lying on the ivest 

 and on the north ; and the prevailing or westerly 

 winds, blowing as they do direct from the ocean, 

 thoy carry from thence tempestuous storms nf rain, 

 with clouds of aqueous vapors, which dissolve the 

 snows of winter: during a considerable portion of 

 the year, the sun's bright rays with their cheering 

 and soul-reviving inlluence, are not seen. 



Serene skies and days of unusual brightness are 

 the characteristics of our climate. With a pure 

 atmosphere and an elevated temperature, the growth 

 of the silkworms to maturity is rapid and wonder- 

 ful. The mulberry from China, which is so emi- 

 nently adapted to afford a succe.'Jsion of food for 

 numerous crops in a season, is also of a rapid and 

 prolonged growth. Those serene skies and con- 

 tinuous days of heat and of sunshine, are necessa- 

 ry duly to ripen and to prepare the juices of the 

 plant; yet in the valleys of our great northern riv- 

 ers, in every interior vale and low and extended 

 plain of the north, this mulberry is liable to suffer 

 injury in its tops. In spring they rise up with a 

 luxuriance of vegetation the most extraordinary. 

 .Such is our climate, those days of unusual bright- 

 ness being alone a!l-sufl3cient fully to elaborate the 

 juices of the leaf,. as has been amply proved, thus 

 converting them into the most healthy and nutri- 

 tious food. Yet at Nonantum hill, and in an ele- 

 vated and bleak situation, I» have several trees of 

 the morns multicaulis, of considerable size and 

 vigorous growth, which, unprotected, have braved 

 the rigors of the last winters and remain uninjured 

 to this day. It is not thus in every vale. At 



Portsmouth, in Lower Virginia, and in latitude 37° 

 12, and where I often visited during the year 18;}9, 

 I found this tree in its hardihood bearing resem- 

 blance to the oak. 



Many oppose the introduction of the silk business 

 into our own country, by perpetually remimling us 

 of the low price of labor in Hindostan and other 

 countries, and the higli price of labor in our own. 

 The same argoments, if arguments they may be 

 called, will apply in a greater or less degree to al- 

 most every branch of industry which we jiursue, 

 either in manufacture.* or in agriculture, but least 

 of all can they justly be applied to any of the pro- 

 ductiims of our agriculture — silk being especially 

 an agricultural production. 



Can the poor Hindoo compete with the anglo- 

 Saxon .' We have . seen a vast country in India, 

 with a population of a hundred millions, brought in- 

 to subjection by conquest, and still held in bondage 

 by an army of from one to two hundred tliousand 

 Britons: thus from .TOO to 1000 Hindoos are held 

 in abject submission by the power of each single 

 auglo-Saxon, and in that proportion they still hold 

 a vast empire. It is absurd to talk of competition 

 between the American free people and such nations 

 as these. In that country men perform those same 

 labors which in ours are performed by animal pow- 

 er, or by horses and oyjn. 



The vast power of Britain has its foundation 

 chiefly in their agriculture, in which they surpass 

 all other nations ; also in their mines of coal and 

 iron With these last, engines and machinery are 

 formed •.vhich, applied to their commerce and man- 

 ufactures, perform labors equivalent to 100,000,000 

 of hands. But in their agricultural operations, ani- 

 mal power is chiefly employed. According to a 

 late distinguished statistical writer, the amount of 

 human labor employed in agriculture in England, 

 is 5,000,000 of all des<:ripfion.3 of persons ; or e- 

 quivalenl only to 2,132,440 effective men power; 

 while the power of horses and oxen, or the animal 

 power which is so employed, is equivalent to 

 22,500,000 efl^ective men power; or ten times as 

 great as the human power so applied. But in 

 America, the proportion of animal power employed" 

 in agriculture, is transcendaiitly great, and far ex- 

 ceeding any thing that is known in the old world. 



In our mines of coal, in our rivers and never- 

 failing streams, we have also the abundant water 

 power, and exceeding that of any other country or 

 nation. By aid of this power and our machinery, 

 a girl will spin a quantity of cotton in a day which 

 would require the labor of 500 girls by the old 

 mode, or. of 500 Hindoos. In old countries, where 

 labor is cheap, cultivation is performed in a great 

 measure by manual labor and the spade. In our 

 own country, our lands being both fertile and cheap, 

 and pasture being abundant, we are enabled cheap- 

 ly to main'ain the vast animal power; the plough 

 being truly the ."American instrument, by aid of 

 these we are enabled to cultirate those lands far 

 cheaper than they can be cultivated in any of those 

 countries where labor is cheap and land dear. The 

 silkworms require the abundant food and pasture 

 all which we are thus enabled cheaply to provide' 



