Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1873-09-27

The leading article in the October num-
Der OF the Popular Science Monthly is de.
voted to silk culture or sericulture in France
by A. D. Quatrefsges, translated by Elira
A. Y oumans. As the manufacture of silk
goods in this country exceeds thirty million
dollars syear in value, creating already
home market for cocoons, which, with our
mulberry climate and soil, can easily be
| produced in Tennessee, we shall discuss this
Industry at some length. Before micro
scopic vegetable parasites attacked silk
worms in France as destructive disease,
land was worth the following prices for
raising mulberry leaves to feed worms aud
| by them be transformed into available silk:
Trayersiers not watered, one acre $500
! francs; fields watered, one acre 1900
francs; mesdows planted with mulberries,
one acre, Il, 400 francs, These prices are
the average of twenty years valuation.
The author who makes the statements says
thai he wss born and raised ia silk grow
ing district, and knows the above prices to
be truthfully stated. Traverslers are FORM
ed on pretty steep hillsides by building
rock val, and filing the space between the
wall and hill or mountain with broken rocS,
to be covered with soil and manure brought
By hand at great labor up the sides of the
bill to cover the narrow rock bed for the
support of mulberry trees. Each wall is
rhe basis Of narrow terrace, and it is OBJ
vious that little plantation made in this
way, all by manual labor, is very ex-
pensive, but pound of silk is valuable.
Arabic lands that will do for tillage purposes
and meSdows are worth in mulberry trees
600 francs and over sper acre. At this
time French coin of five francs will buy
more than a greenback dollar, so that a
mulberry plantation is worth two thousand
| four bur dred dollars per acre. Even allow
ing the translator has given the word acre
where the French word hectare should be
used, which is about two and one-half acres,
this silk producing land is worth about one
Thousand dollars per acre. 1t is easy to IN.
derstsnd that as the industrial and COM
mercial classes ia all nations have larger
incomes, and population increases, there is
a steadily growing demand for more
silk dresses, larger patterns, and
more silk goods Of every kind.
This article has stood the test of experience
for several thousand years, and is IN no
danger of going out of use and fashion.
We can raise in Tennessee the naorotlS nsul
ticGsIis as well SIS our native mulberry, and
We have a considerable number of women
AID children who could pick mulberry
leaves and feed silk worms as easily as they
gather blackberries. QuAtrefages dwells
with delight on the marked change for the
better witnessed among the pessantry of
France in the silk districts after the Intro
duction Of this industry. Practically, it
changes their labor which is both light and
healthy, into gold, and we are happy to say
thSt we can discover no serious impedi-
ment in The way of planting silk-culture
successfully in this State.
But cholera destroys silk-worms as well
as humsns, aud this pestilence deserves 10
be studied for the light it throws on the
fact that microscopic cellular plants subsist
and multiply their species on and in the
blood and alinentary juices of living ami
mails. As furnishing food for lions, tigers,
vegetable and animal parasites, man is no
exception as compared with worms eaten
by birds. In 1858, 56,OOO,000 pounds Of
cocoons raised on q comparatively small
territory, were worth to the producers $780,
100000 francs, or thirty-six million dollars.
MuScdrdine is the name given 70 the first
malady which proved destructive to worms,
and is a species of mould Or microscopic
mushroom. 1t invades the whole interior
body of the animal, and finally
covers the outside IS a white powder.
Each particle of this powder is the seed or
germ of new plant that grows where it
falls, if the conditions are favorable.
Science happily found a remedy for this
parasite, but we are compelled to add that
very soon a more formidable scourge sp-
peared in another parasite called pebrtTle.
The author says "it is a pestilence like the
| cholera. Under the influence of this
scource, the chambers of the silk worm no
| longer thrive; most Of the worms die with
out producing silk. Those that survive as
butter flies give infected eggs, and the next
generation is worse than the first. To get
healthy eggs we had to go to the neighbor-
ing countries; but other countries have been
| invaded in their turn. To day we
have to get them from Japan"
The readers attention is called to the fact
that 8 true cholera pa asite sends its germs
from parent to offspring through the egg Of
| the mother butterfly. 1t is demonstrated
that even our hereditary malsdies may be
caused by parasites. In treating of the
| pebrine disease, Prof. Huxley says: "The
Italian naturalist Philippi discovered in the
blood of silk.worms affected By this strange
disease pebri1le, multitude Of cylindrical
| corpuscules each about the oDe-six thou
sandLh of an inch long. These have been
carefully studied by Lebert, and named by
bin PdlhiStophyton, for the reason that in
sut jec!s in which the disease is strongly de-
veloped, the corpuscules swarm in every It's
sue and organ ofthe body, and even pass into
the undeveloped eggs of the female moth"
Nothing but the most perfect instruments
nd considerable experience with the mi
croscrope can qualify one to make research
es of this kind; yet any farmer can under
stand thst the same mulberry leaves that
fern the flesh and blood of silk-worms for
thu nourishment of pebrine, will form beef
In, if nl,n Ia shn WILLY