558 
ON THE PRODUCTION OF SILK AT KAMPTEE. 
twenty or thirty joints, four or five inches 
long, rarely l)ulging. The colour is a pale 
yellow, sometimes approaching to green. Its 
juice is often very abundant, the clarifying is 
always easy, and after a long drought, the 
best are rich in essential salt which is very 
tine, and easily obtained, if the boiling be well 
conducted. After abundant rains, particular- 
ly in a backward season, the juice is very poot , 
and contains a gieater or less proportion of 
mucous juice, which has been prevented by 
these circumstances from forming into essen- 
tial salt. Tlie boiling must consequently be 
managed with the greatest care, to obtain 
the essential salt. The cane is often badly 
made and crooked. From all these particu- 
lars, it is evident how needful it is, to tlie suc- 
cessful cultivation of the cane, that its general 
nature and peculiar functions should be un- 
derstood, so that we may know how, most 
judiciously, to direct and assist the action of 
the various agents of vegetation and matura- 
tion. Water being one of the most powerful 
of these agents in the vegetation of the cane, 
the cares of the cultivator should be directed 
towards the best means for supplying it, and 
for causing the cane to profit, as much as 
possible, by all that it receives, either in the 
form of rain, or by irrigation. As a principal 
means of effecting this, the ground sliould be 
very much loosened round the plant, the faci- 
lities for which operation necessarily vary 
according to the nature of the land, and many 
other circumstances.” 
Before giving our author’s directions for 
diminishing or removing these obstacles, it 
will be necessary to allude to his opinion 
as to what soil is most favorable to the pro- 
duction of the cane ; whence may be deduced 
the remedies required to approximate other 
soils ; but we must postpone the subject 
until our next. 
Art. II. — On the production of silk at 
Kamptee, By Miss Anna Calder, 
with Mr. Prinsep’s Report on the 
Raw Silk, from a printed copy forwarded 
to the Agricultural Society of India. 
By George Norton, of Madras, 
Experimental cultivation in Western In- 
dia. 
Extract of a Letter from Mr. Shake- 
spear, on an improved method in 
winding silk. 
On the Silks of Assam. By Captain 
Jenkins. — Trans. Agricultural and 
Horticultural Society, 1836. 
We shall now proceed to present our 
readers with some valuable papers in the 
Transactions of the Agricultural Society of 
Calcutta, for 1836, in order that the dis- 
coveries of zealous horticulturists may be 
diffused not only throughout our Indian pos- 
sessions, but spread into Europe and America. 
We shall first consider the various articles 
on the culture of the mulberry plant, mode 
of rearing the worm, and the manufacture 
of silk. The first article is from Miss Cal- 
der, who observes, that the specimen of silk 
forwarded by her, was collected — 
“ From November, 1827, to August in the 
following year, in which month I was oblig- 
ed to give them up ; and during the first two 
I met with many accidents in i*earing the 
insect, being then perfectly unacquainted 
with all its enemies, of which I found, by ex- 
perience, a host to contend with. 1 had but a 
trifling produce, merely sufficient to teach me 
the cultui’e and the spinning it off the cocoons, 
in which I wasted much, having no instruc- 
tion or any thing to guide me but my own 
ideas ; after that, my stock increased, and 
was generally from three to four thousand, 
sometimes not near so many, in the month. 
I was however very limited in my means for 
keeping them, having only a small bathing 
room for the purpose, and in attendance also, 
for the care, spinning, and all was performed 
by myself and two little girls under the age 
of twelve years (natives), one of whom 
is with me now', and equally anxious with 
me about our industrious little favourites ; 
neither had I then one mulberry leaf in my 
own compound. The skein which I send is 
but the sixteenth part of what I can produ, 
besides I have used some and given much 
away to my acquaintance, never supfiosing 
that I should offer myself as a candidate 
for support in the culture of silk ; but 1 find 
myself in a station so adapted to the purpose, 
that I have no doubt, with a little assistance, 
I could make the article an object with every 
poor person who had a spot whereon to plant 
a mulberry-tree, so simple is the mode I 
adopt in the care of it. Here, within the 
limits of my own compound, I have suffici- 
ent food for millions, large overgrown trees 
of the finest description ; and 1 even think 
1 shall be able to make the worm feed itself, 
after a while ; but as I never had an oppor- 
tunity of trying that experiment, I wdll not 
be positive ; time will tell. Just now my 
object is to see what my own single effort 
would be likely to produce from this spot ; 
but as I have not the means of accomplish- 
ing that, I should require assistance, for the 
purpose of raising sheds with chunamed re- 
servoirs for water, a couple of men to attend 
the trees, bullocks to w'ater them, and women 
or girls, whom I would teach to collect and 
wind the silk, whilst the insect itself would 
require the care of one steady person and 
some boys, all of eourse under my own eye. 
Now all this I cannot afford to do ; but my 
positive belief is, that it would, in the course 
of twelve or eighteen months, amply repay 
