64 
THE ART OF REARING 
When they are laid upon the papers, they 
should be given some young leaves chopped 
eggs, and one single room to rear the worms in, how much 
it imports that he should not reckon on the very late-hatched 
eggs, not from any defect in the quality of them, but that lie 
may not have worms of a day old mixed with worms four 
days old, thus interfering with the general progress of cul- 
tivation. 
The proprietor, on the contrary, who has many boxes of 
eggs to bring forth, can dispose of the early eggs to his te- 
nants, and by these means need never mix the silk-worms of 
different ages. Then, if one tenant holds those of the first 
day's hatching, and another holds the worms hatched the 
fourth day, no evil accrues, all proceeds with regularity and 
ease, as each tenant has equal-aged silk- worms to attend to. 
When the proprietor has only a small box of eggs to hatch, 
it is better to cast away those that come forth the first day, and 
not to reckon on those that are not come forth the third day; 
and thus, by having only those hatched in the two interme- 
diate days to attend to, much trouble will be saved. 
If in this case the cultivator wished to act with that theo- 
retical exactness, which is the ground of every art, and if lie 
wished to know what really is the quantity of worms he 
rears, when the third day’s hatching is over, he should weigh 
the eggs that remain unhatched, adding one-twelfth to their 
weight which they had lost in the stove-room, as may be seen 
in Chap. V. § 3. ; and thus he will exactly know the 
effective quantity of eggs to which the worms correspond. 
In general, the worms hatched the first day are very 
few ; but calculating upon this view, that sixty-eight silk- 
worms are equivalent to the weight of an egg, the proprie- 
tor, upon this calculation, might throw them away if there 
were not many hatched. It is far better to lose a few worms 
of the first day’s hatching, and eggs not hatched the third 
day, than to be inconvenienced during the whole progress 
of rearing them ; by adding a small quantity of eggs to 
those that are next to be hatched, the loss is easily made up. 
