If bees continue in one hive for four or five years, they always degenerate, and become both fewer and weaker: the reason is, the combs for breeding are generally and on purpose made larger than the rest; every time a bee is hatched in one, a skin or coat is left behind which reduces the size; and, in time, it becomes too small to produce a bee of its proper dimensions; and occasions a necessity for their hav. ing frequently new habitations, which they will always accept, if you provide them a good situation,

and clean hives.

then it does not begin bearing till it is about twenty years of age. In this province they reckon, that five trees should produce two pounds of silk.

I had the curiosity to examine their method of feeding the silkworms in Spain. These industrious spinners are spread upon wicker shelves, which are placed one above the other all round, and likewise in the middle of each apartment, so as to leave room only for the good woman to pass with their provisions. In one house, I saw the produce of six ounces of seed, and was informed, that to every ounce, during their feeding season, they allow sixty arrobas of leaves, valued at two pounds five shillings. Each ounce of seed is supposed to yield ten pounds of silk, at twelve ounces to the pound. March 28th, the worms began to hatch; and May 22nd, they went up to spin. In the intermediate space, on the eleventh day they slept; and, on the fourteenth, they awoke to eat again, receiving food twice a day till the twenty-second day. Having then slept a second time, without interruption,for three days, they were fed thrice a day; and thus alternately conti nued eating eight days, and sleeping three, till the forty-seventh day; after which theyeat voraciously for ten days, and not being stinted, consumed sometimes from thirty to fifty arrobas in four-and-twenty hours. They then climbed up into rosemary bushes, fixed for that the shelves, and purpose between began to spin.

Upon examination, they appear evidently to draw out two threads by the same operation, and to glue these together, covering them with wax. This may be proved by spi

rit of wine, which will dissolve the wax, and leave the thread. Having exhausted her magazine, the worm changes her form, and becomes a nymph, till, on the seventy-first day, from the time that the little animal was hatched, when she comes forth with plumage, and, having found her mate, begins to lay her eggs. At the end of six days from this period of existence, having answered the end of their creation, they both lie down and die. This would be the natural progress; but, to preserve the silk, the animal is killed by heat, and the cones being thrown into boiling water, they begin winding off the silk.

Silk-worms, in close rooms, are much subject to disease; but in the open air, as in China, they are not only more healthy and more hardy, but make better silk. It appears to

be precisely the same with them, as with the sick confined in hospitals, or foundlings shut up in workhouses; for this reason, the ingenious abbé Bertholon recommends procuring from China some of the wild silkworms, and leaving them in the open air, protected only by a shed from rain. He is persuaded that the race might thus be made so hardy, in process of time, as to survive all the variations of the seasons.

In China they have three kinds of silk-worm, two living on the leaves of the ash and of the oak; the third thriving best on a species of the pepper-tree, called sagara, whose silk, remarkable for strength, washes like linen, and is not apt to be greased.

The progress of this article of luxury in Europe, after it had been introduced from Asia by two monks, who brought worms to Constantinople, was very slow. There, and

in Greece, it continued little noticed by the rest of Europe, from the year 551 of the Christian æra, till Roger II. king of Sicily, pillaged Athens, A. D. 1130, and brought silk-worms to Palermo. From thence they were speedily conveyed to Italy and Spain ;but, till the reign of Queen Elizabeth, silk stockings were unknown in England; and, with respect to Scotland, there is in being a MS. letter, from James VI. to the earl of Mar, requesting the loan of a pair, in which the earl had appeared at court, because he was going to give audience to the French embassador.

On some circumstances relative to silk-worms; from the French of M. Faujas de St. Fond.

work does not allow me to enter into the particular details, on the construction of a proper place for the keeping of silk-worms, it is, however, necessary to say a word or two on its interior order and proportions; but to avoid prolixity, I refer the public to a very simple plan, which I have had made, and from which directions may be taken.

LTHOUGH the bounds of this

It will be seen, by the above-mentioned plan, that the inside of the building is forty feet long, by oneand-twenty wide. The length of the boards of a table must be six feet, and the width four feet six inches; for when made five feet wide, they are too large and less convenient : five of these tables must be placed on a line lengthways, which forms a line of thirty feet long, above which are placed six other rows of tables, at the distance of fifteen

inches,

Inches one above the other; this forms in all six and thirty tables, which occupies half the room. On the other side are placed in a parallel line, and in the same order, the same number of tables; so that the total number amounts to seventy tables. I have, between the two rows, that is to say, the gallery which runs through the middle of the building, an empty space, of four feet wide, for the conveniency of attending to the tables; a like space is left quite round the room; which ought to be at least ten feet high; if circumstances will admit of giving it twelve feet in height, it would be better.

General experience,' says M. Rigaud de Lisle, has ascertained, that an ounce of the seed well kept, and well managed, occupies, on their fourth casting, ten tables, six feet long, and five wide which may serve as a rule for placing in the room only the necessary number of

ounces.

It is certain, that when a small quantity only of silk-worms are raised, they succeed better, because the attention to them is less divided, and that every circumstance concurs to their advantage. In this case, then, an ounce of the seed occupies at least ten tables, of six feet long, by five wide; but if five, six, seven, eight ounces, or even more, of seed are raised in the same place, there necessarily exists a proportional diminution in the produce to the augmentation, and to the quantity of silk-worms raised; and whatever trouble or care may be taken, it is impossible that eight ounces can succeed so well as two ounces, or that sixteen should equal the success of eight ounces. It is, therefore, at present known to the best observers, VOL. XXXIII,

Y

that the rooms, destined for the purpose, should never be more extensive than to allow of room for the raising of seven or eight ounces of the seed. It is preferable, on those estates which abound in mulberrytrees, to construct several separate buildings and to confide to different people the care of each, from whence the greatest advantages would result, the attention and care would be more reunited, emulation would animate the work, and rivalship redouble zeal and application.

The room of which I have given the plan, containing seventy tables, would suffice for seven ounces of the seed; strictly speaking, it would contain a greater quantity, but I would not advise the exceeding of seven ounces.

Instead of having four chimneys, one in each angle, I require but two, placed at the extremity of the line which cuts transversely the great side of the plan; they must be placed opposite to each other.

Two stoves, made either of brick or of delf, must be placed at each extremity of the line that divides the building by the middle, in the smaller side of the plan; the place would, by this method, be better and more equally heated, whenever circumstances required it.

Four air-holes, a foot in diameter, either round or of a square form, closed with wooden shutters, should be placed at the four angles of the ground (for I suppose the room to be either on the first or second floor). They will answer two purposes, viz. that of acting as ventilators, in case of need; and that of conveying away, through those openings, the litter, and all the filth, and even the mephitic air; which from its weight, fills always the lower re

gions:

gions: a fifth air-hole may be placed even in the middle part of the room. The room thus disposed, let us suppose the silk-worms to have been conducted with the most happy success, until the time draws near for their climbing, and let us then cast an attentive and satisfied look on this similitude of vigorous individuals, whose colour, motions, and appetite announce the most perfect health; what encouragement and animation then prevails; all the former trouble and fatigue are forgotten, this brilliant picture offers an attractive prospect of certain succes.

How much less tranquil should we be, at that moment, did we but consider, with the eye of a philosopher, and of a naturalist, the real and many evils proceeding from vicissi tudes of air alone, with which this immensity of precious insects are threatened, who certainly were never designed by nature to live in so numerous a society; confined to places which, though in appearance commodious, are nevertheless close prisons, where the purity of the air is, without ceasing, corrupted; removed from their native climate, and taken from the tree which offers them food unsullied by the hand of man, they are subjected to fasting; to the most rigorous restraint; and plagued by fumigations, which are believed to be agreeable to them, because we falsely judge of their sensations by our own.

We will calculate, if possible, a part of the dangers to which they are exposed, from this state of servitude. An ounce of seed incloses forty-two thousand eggs; if they were all to hatch, and each silk worm prospered, the produce of the ounce would be two hundred and ten pounds of cocoons, allowing one

hundred cocoons to each pound. But, not to establish suppositions instead of truths, we will reduce to twenty thousand silk-worms, or twenty thousand cocoons, the produce of forty-two thousand eggs, which is taking away more than the half, there will still remain one hundred pounds of cocoons per ounce, which must always be the case, when a little attention has been paid to the keeping of the silk-worms. The spinning place for the silk-worms, of which we have given the plan, being designed to hold seven ounces of seed, each of which contains one hundred and forty thousand insects, and each worm being provided with eighteen stygmates, it follows that there are two millions five hundred and twenty thousand lungs destined to breathe, and make an immense consumption of air. It is to be observed, that, besides this, there must be, at least, two people to direct this room; and that a man consumes, at each respiration, thirty cubical inches of the air, and that he draws his breath, at least, fifteen times in a minute, which amounting to four hundred and fifty cubical inches of air, proves, that, between the two, nine hundred cubical inches of air is spent in a minute. Air which they charge with mephitic gas. Besides the light of the lamps, the fires they are obliged to make, and the effluvia of the leaves, which are all fresh, and additional causes of the waste of the air in this place.

Is it astonishing, after this, that the smallest neglect, in point of renewing the air, is of such infinite consequence, in a place where this element is already so wasted, that the least degree of alteration, beyond a certain period, should, in a