THE SlL FOEESTS 307 



tion of healtliy silk-producing insects in captivity, and a 

 fresh, supply is therefore procured annually from their 

 native hills. They live chiefly on the leaves of the saj tree, 

 whose foliage, being deciduous, would not afford safety 

 to the insect in its chrysalis stage, if the cocoon were 

 attached, as other species are, to the leaf alone. The 

 instinct of the little creature teaches it therefore to anchor 

 its cocoon by a strong silken rope to the leaf-stalk, where 

 it sways about in safety after every leaf has dropped from 

 the tree. The cocoons brought from the jungles by the 

 breeders are attached to pollarded saj trees, grown near 

 their villages, till -the moths have hatched and paired, 

 when the females are captured and made to lay their 

 eggs in close vessels, where they are incubated by heat. 

 The worms reared from the eggs are again placed on the 

 saj trees, where they form their cocoons, which are then 

 spun into the rough silk known as " tusser." The business 

 is a very precarious one, much depending for success on 

 favourable weather. Superstition of course seizes this 

 uncertainty for her own, and the purchased blessings of 

 the Byga priest must accompany the cocoons from their 

 native hills, if the breeder of the plains is to expect 

 success. 



Besides such scanty exportation of the minor produce 

 of these wilds as I have described, almost their only 

 economic use has hitherto been the splendid grazing they 

 afford for countless herds of cattle, annually brought to 

 them from great distances in the open country on both 

 sides during the hot season. Fine grass and abundance 

 of shade and water make this one of the finest grazing 

 countries in all India, and the amount of wealth which 

 thus actually seems to depend on its continuance as a 

 waste is very great. 



At first sight some hesitation might be felt at the pros- 

 pect of these great grazing-grounds being reclaimed for 

 cultivation, when it is considered how all-essential to the 

 life of a country like India is the breeding of large stocks 

 of oxen. Here the draught ox takes the place of the farm- 

 horse and the steam-engine of England. Cattle are bred, 

 not as an article of food, but as affording perhaps the 



