Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 29.djvu/334

320 larger they, of course, needed more space, and our room was gradually filling with extemporized tables and shelves covered with trays. The cleaning of one tray seems a small matter, but when there are over fifty trays to clean and fill with fresh leaves it takes a good while, and often we did not get to bed until midnight. As early as possible in the morning we were again at work feeding the worms, and for thirty days we were kept incessantly employed, oftentimes feeling discouraged, as the leaves were hard to get and the weather hot and debilitating. Still, we were determined to do the best we could, and so persevered in our self-imposed task.

Thirty days from the time of hatching, having lost no worms by disease, the spinning of the first cocoon was begun, and a relief it was to see a large worm crawling restlessly around the edge of the box leaving traces of silk in the corners. Two days later the worms were spinning in earnest, and we found our work of feeding and cleaning somewhat lessened. We tied together twigs and straw, upon which the worms made their cocoons. Following a friend's suggestion, we begged from a grocer some of the straw coverings of wine-bottles, and these the worms seemed to like very much. The room now presented a very different appearance from that which it had a week or two before. Instead of the rows of boxes, the tables were covered with straw tent-like arrangements upon which were the yellow cocoons.

Before all had finished spinning, we thought it time to steam a part of the cocoons, and here we met with our first difficulty. None of the books on the subject, which we had at our disposal, gave any very definite ideas as to the method by which this part of the work might be accomplished.

Finally, after considerable perplexity, we made arrangements to have the steaming done at a boiler-room. We laid about eight hundred of the cocoons on a layer of cloth netting in a large box, at one end of which a hole had been made and a round gas-tube inserted. To this tube was attached a pipe from the boiler, and for twenty minutes, the time specified in a report published by the Department of Agriculture, the steam was allowed to enter the box. At the end of that time we found to our dismay that many of the cocoons had been blown to one end of the box, forming a sticky mass. If we had been almost discouraged before, we certainly were discouraged now. However, we dried them in the sun, and a few were sent to the Woman's Silk-Culture Association in Philadelphia, with a letter, asking whether we had steamed them too much, and for information in regard to steaming the rest, of which we also inclosed a sample. In answer to our request, a printed circular containing general directions was sent to us, but no special directions as to steaming the others; but we were informed that our worms had been insufficiently fed; the cocoons were small, and steamed too much; and the fresh cocoons could not be reeled.