SILK-WORMS. 
235 
and fallen down in moving the cloths. They 
must be collected into a small pasteboard box; 
the layer should not be more than half the 
breadth of your finger thick. The same must be 
done with all the eggs found attached elsewhere 
but on the cloths. 
It is of little consequence that all the eggs 
should be good. When you wish to hatch them, 
they must be weighed as soon as they are put in 
the store-room. If they are weighed again the 
third day after the birth of the worms, the quan- 
tity of those not impregnated will be ascertained. 
If the season is hot, you will observe that many 
silk-worms are produced in the first 10 or 15 days, 
counting from the day of laying the eggs. In 
some years I have seen many hatched in this short 
-space, and sometimes I have observed that these 
eggs belonged almost all to the same female. 
This precocity is of no inconvenience ; it depends 
on the particular conformation of the embryo or 
of the shell . The egg from which the worm is 
come forth is to be distinguished by its white 
colour, and because it remains attached to the 
cloth. 
Upon the cloths where the eggs are, much ex- 
crementitious matter will be found, deposited by 
the moths. These impurities are not hurtful to 
the eggs, provided care be taken not to raise 
the cloths before they ai*e perfectly dry. 
