MAGAZINE OF SCIENCE AND ART. 
85 
tinue my experiments. I am now in the midst of the 
rains, our worst season for cocoons, but still I have these 
few, and am bestowing on them the greatest possible 
care ; what may be their ultimate fate J must leave for 
a future communication. I have manv pounds of eggs 
pf the different crosses still retaining the nature of an¬ 
nuals, but as 1 have spent three years in trying ineffec¬ 
tually to engraft a superior nature and invigorate our 
common stock, I feel discouraged, and would gladly 
have the opinion of naturalists as to the probability of 
my object ever being attainable, and tlje proper steps tp 
be* taken for realizing it. 
I have every belief in the possibility of improving 
pur Bengal silkworjns, under a better system of man¬ 
agement; and have go doubt, those of Europe have only 
acquired their present perfection by care and tuition. 
The superb cocoons I saw at the late French Exhibition, 
were a proof of what art and careful management can 
produce. 
Silkworms are said to have been originally imported 
from China. I jaaye lately seen specimens of 
the best domestic cocoons now being reared in that 
country, and those common in Europe are more than 
double their size and weight in silk, thus clearly proving 
that the worm has eitfier degenerated in its natural 
country, or that European skill has worked the vastly 
improving change in its nature and constitution; this 
latter, I think, is the truth the main difference in the 
cocoon is in the size, the shajK? beln? still much the 
same. I however, Allude tp the China white cocoon 
only. 
In Syria., tl)o cpcoon§ are in size and quality nearly 
equal to French, and as their climate is not far different 
from Bengal in our dry season, I see no good reaspn why 
we should not bo able to produce as fine cocoons, A 
long and tedious crossing may he necessary to work the 
change, hut whatever labour is required, the immeuse 
improvement in quality and produce, that is certain to 
result, would amply compensate for both labour and 
expense; and as the gain would be a public good, the 
.Government and public should encourage the under¬ 
taking. I am willing to present eggs to any one 
disposed to follow my steps, apd tjie more diffused the 
experiments the better chance of success. 
I am not satisfied that die present domestic races of 
silkworms are not originally wild, and fed on other 
food than mulberry; t}ie forests of India teem with 
various species of silkworms feeding on all sorts of 
/eaves; accident may have led to the choice of mulberry, 
and it certainly is the best suited for yielding a mellow 
and easy winding gilk, 
I have not been able to make any experiments on any 
silkworms, except on the Jiomtyx ITuttoni, hut I 
believe it possible to domesticate a great many of the 
wild species, and, by changing their food, to make 
them produce a silk less harsh and crude than they now 
do, and cocoons that will yield their thread freely, 
without the aid of alkali or other chemicals just as the 
domestic worm does, The Societe Zoolopique d’ Ac- 
climatation are producing wonderful changes, and why 
should not we do the same in silkworms. 1 see no 
reason to the contrary. 
As this paper may fall into the hands of practical 
people in Europe, w ho may he disposed to aid a good 
object, I will subjoin a few remarks upon the mode of 
rearing silkworms, usually practised by the natives in 
Bengal. I am not sure if their defective system conld 
be remedied, whether the produce of our present stock 
of worms could not he vastly improved, so as to render 
the importation of foreign species unnecessary. These 
remarks will enable my readers to form an opinion on 
the subject, but I must mention that the natives are so 
pertinaciously callous of improvements if they involve 
any labour or expense, and are almost asimmoveable in 
their prejudices as the pyramids, that unless any benefi¬ 
cial changes can ho effected in a most simple and 
inexpensive wav, I havo little hope of their attempting 
and persevering in them. 
In the first place I will try and describe the 
mulberry, and mode of cultivating it. The sort chiefly 
grown here is the wild black species, both the indented 
and unindented leaf, planted indiscriminately, a handful 
of cuttings of both sorts forming one bush ; and these 
bushes in rows, about a foot apart, cover large tracts of 
ground. The natives caro little about the species, nor 
do they consider which is best suited for the worms; 
suffice it to say, they follow the customs of their fore¬ 
fathers, and that satisfies them; they, however, bestow 
much labour on the cultivation, and from wel 1 managed 
lands, get several extraordinarily large crops of leaf 
during the year ; it is cut every time close to tlm ground, 
and after a little hoeing it springs up again most rapidly. 
The leaves are cut into small pieces for the very young 
worms, hut after that stems and all are given just as 
they come from the field. As far as I can judge of the 
mulberry, it is quite as good for feeding worms and pro¬ 
ducing silk as the large tree mulberry of Europe. Cer¬ 
tainly, the French and Italian worms I fed on it gave 
cocoons quite as good, or even better, than the specimens 
that accompanied the eggs. Mulberry is very expensive, 
and the natives are prone to half feed and stint their 
worms in consequence, to the great injury, of course, of 
the cocoon, It is sufficient to them it they have quan¬ 
tity ; they have little regard for goodness of quality in 
any thing. 
In the selection of eggs, there it a great choice in 
India as to the period for incubation, hut as the cocoons 
are alike in every district nearly, there is hut little 
choice as to quality. In one part or other of Bengal 
worms are spinning nearly every day in the year, hut in 
the rains fewer worms are reared from the low r er lands 
than at any other period, partly because the mulberry 
is frequently subject to inundation, and partly from the 
rice crops at this Reason demanding more attention. At 
this present moment, ]5th September, 1850, most of the 
mulberry in Bengal, and very many of the filatures 
also, are some feet under water. The inundation begins 
to recede in September, and by the end of October, tbo 
mulberry is cut and thrown away, and the lands in a 
forward state of cultivation. Early in November the 
majority of the rearers procure the cocoons, from which 
they get the seed for the November bund, the largest wo 
have in the year. Eggs are not sold here as in Europe ; 
seed cocoons are sold instead; the rearers pair the moths 
and manage them as they like,—they have no fixed sys¬ 
tem, When seed cocoons are dear, the good and bad are 
all equal in their estimation; they never sort them ; 
they pay high for them, and cannot afford to lose any— 
sucji is their reasoning. Rearing-houses in Bengal are 
of mud or mat walls, and straw roof ; they are generally 
very small, and, notwithstanding the great heat, have no 
windows or ventilators, or any other means of lighting 
the Toom, except a single fino lattice-screened door-way ; 
they- are alike indifferent to light or temperature, to 
light particularly, and they have some reason for this 
for without screens of lattice net work, the flies would 
enter and destroy every worm in two or three days j 
even now, millions are destroyed yearly by the flies en¬ 
tering tiie room at feeding time, and many a batch of 
apparently good cocoons over night have been found de¬ 
stroyed in the morning by maggots coming out of them 
from fly blows on the worms before spinning. In cold 
weather I have known fires used by a few at the doors of 
their yenring-houses, but very rarely, and the good is 
questionable for such unvcntilatcd buildings. The fluc¬ 
tuations of temperature in Bengal arc considerable 
during the year, and even in the 24 hours frequently eg 
much as 20 decrees; no attempt is made to equalise it 
in the rearing-houses, which are crammed with worms 
and necessarily close and offensive; our worms, there¬ 
fore, passing through all these disadvantages at ouro 
prove their hardy nature. From worms generally in¬ 
differently fed, and reared in masses, in close, unventi- 
lated, and unhealthy houses, you cannot expect the Lest 
cocoons, hut from tbo very few independent and rn< sfc 
careful rearers, we do sometimes get very fair quality, 
from 15 lbs. of which, or about 9,500 cocoons, you may 
reel 1 lb. of very good silk ; but every batch of cocoons 
