Page:The history of silk, cotton, linen, wool, and other fibrous substances 2.djvu/141

 Worms newly freed from their exuviæ are easily distinguished from others by the pale color and wrinkled appearance of their new skin. This latter quality, however, soon disappears, through the repletion and growth of the insect, which continues to feed during five days. At this time its length will be increased to half an inch; when it is attacked by a second sickness, followed by a second moulting, the manner of performing which is exactly similar to the former. Its appetite then again returns, and is indulged during other five days, in the course of which time its length increases to three quarters of an inch: it then undergoes its third sickness and moulting. These being past in all respects like the former, and five more days of feeding having followed, it is seized by its fourth sickness, and casts its skin for the last time in the caterpillar state. The worm is now about one and a half or two inches long. This last change being finished, the worm devours its food most voraciously, and increases rapidly in size during ten days.

The silk-worm has now attained to its full growth, and is a slender caterpillar from two and a half to three inches in length (See Figure 1. Plate III.). The peculiarities of its structure may be better examined now than in its earlier stages. It can readily be seen that the worm has twelve membranous rings round its body, parallel to each other; and which, answering to the movements of the animal, mutually contract and elongate. It has sixteen legs, in pairs: six in front, which are covered with a sort of shell or scale, and are placed under the three first rings, and cannot be either sensibly lengthened, or their position altered. The other ten legs are called holders: these are membranous, flexible, and attached to the body under the rings, being furnished with little hooks, which assist the insect in climbing. The skull is inclosed in a scaly substance, similar to the covering of the first six legs. The jaws are indented or serrated like the teeth of a saw, and their strength is great considering the size of the insect. Its mouth is peculiar, having a vertical instead of an horizontal aperture; and the worm is furnished with eighteen breathing holes, placed at equal distances down the body, nine on each side. Each of these holes is supposed to be the termination of a particular organ of respiration.