LEPIDOPTERA. 221 
in a very different way from that of M. Laffemas. This was 
Olivier de Serres, the author of the ‘“Théatre de l’agriculture ;” 
he whom Henry IV. called his lord and master in agriculture. 
Olivier de Serres was the first among his countrymen who had 
published instructions regarding the cultivation of mulberry 
trees and the rearing of silkworms. Henry IV., who had noticed 
his writings, called him to Paris; and, on his solicitation, caused 
twenty thousand mulberry trees and a great quantity of silk- 
worms’ eggs, of which a distribution was made over the whole 
of France, to be imported from Italy. From that moment, 
sericiculture was propagated rapidly in the Cévennes, in Pro- 
vence, in Languedoc, in Touraime, and many other provinces. 
Mulberry trees were planted at Fontainebleau, in the royal 
park of Tournelles, and even in the garden of the Tuileries, 
where an Italian lady, named Julle, reared silkworms for 
Henry IV. 
Notwithstanding this great impulse, sericiculture dwindled 
away on the death of that king. It received a fresh impulse 
under Colbert, the great minister, who succeeded in creating the 
spirit of commerce and trade in France. New manufactories were 
established, and plantations of mulberry trees formed in many of 
the provinces. All this progress was suddenly brought to a stand- 
still by the iniquitous revocation of the Edict of Nantes, which 
deprived France of her leading commercial men. Driven from 
their own country, the Protestant families of Cévennes established 
abroad silk manufactories, of which the fabrics rivalled those of 
French production. 
In the eighteenth century, the intendants of the provinces tried, 
but with very slight success, to give a fresh impetus to sericiculture 
in France. The Abbé Boissier de Sauvages published, about 
1760, some works, which prove him to have been a patient 
observer, an accurate reasoner, and a clever rearer of silkworms. 
Boissier de Sauvages is the father of modern silk-culture. During 
the first Revolution, men’s minds were occupied with graver 
subjects than the cultivation of the mulberry tree. But, on the 
return of peace, they got to work again on all sides. In 1808, 
the minister Chaptal estimated the weight of the cocoon harvest 
at between five or six thousand kilogrammes; whilst the 
