512 On the Natural Products about [No. 115. 



leaves of which are the insect's food ; every branch he carefully clears 

 of the different species of ants by vi^hich they may be infested, pre- 

 venting the access of others, by surrounding the trunk of the tree at its 

 foot with ashes. The other enemies are kept off by shouting, throw- 

 ing stones, firing guns, &c. Their life at this time would appear, 

 by their own account, to be one of the most unremitting toil ; to devote 

 themselves to which they forswear not only every indulgence, but 

 every comfort; and it rouses the apathetic peasant of Telengana to 

 eloquence, when he recounts what privations he undergoes, what 

 pleasure he derives himself, and what incessant labour he incurs while 

 watching the rearing of the worm, and the perfecting of its work. 

 The tusser butterfly is a species of Saturnia, probably the aphia 

 described by Dr. Heifer as the most common of the native species. 

 I send a specimen of a female moth.* 



From four to five hundred of the cocoons are sold to the Bunnyas 

 and weavers for one rupee ; the moth is killed by means of heat. There 

 are three tusser harvests, one at the end of the rains, the other two in 

 the cold season. The winding of the silk is accomplished by boiling 

 the cocoons, separating the floss of which no use is made, and twisting 

 eight or ten filatures from as many cocoons on the middle of the thigh 

 with the left hand to be w^ound on the instrument, of which a muster is 

 sent : this instrument the middle bar of the wood is held lightly in the 

 hand of the workman and made to move in a semicircle. An ounce 

 and a quarter of silk is the average daily winding of a single workman ; 

 his wages are, at the common rate of one pice for winding the silk 

 of fifty cocoons, about three pice a day, as he cannot wind more silk 

 than from a hundred and fifty cocoons. The pice, however, are large, 

 and go there by eight to the rupee. f The only dyes used for the tusser 

 silk, as far at least as my observation or inquiry has gone, are the 

 flowers of the palas and turmeric ; by the former the usual familiar 

 colour is produced, by the latter a golden yellow is brought out after 

 the threads are for some time immersed in a solution of ashes. The 

 warp threads are stiffened with rice congee. 



Wax. — A good deal of honeycomb is brought into Madhapore and 



Chinnore by the hill people. It is quite impossible, under the present 



* This has not reached us, but it would be very curious to know, if that of Assam, 

 described by Dr. Heifer and Mr. Hugon is the same as this of Hunumkonda. Ed. 



t So in MSS. 



