Page:Farmers of forty centuries.djvu/340

322 from toil, the basic units of three of the oldest nations, go to the uncultivated hill lands and from the wild oak and the millions of insects which they help to feed upon it, not only create a valuable export trade but procure material for clothing, fuel, fertilizer and food, for the large chrysalides, cooked in the reeling of the silk, may be eaten at once or are seasoned with sauce to be used later. Besides this, the last unreelable portion of each cocoon is laid aside to be manufactured into silk wadding and into soft mattresses for caskets upon which the wealthy lay their dead.