Page:The history of silk, cotton, linen, wool, and other fibrous substances 2.djvu/250



C. Bridgman, missionary at Canton, China, a native of Hampshire county, with the request that he would procure and forward me some mulberry seed of the most approved kind for growing in China, for the use of members of the agricultural society. He promptly attended to the request; the seed was forwarded and sown in the spring of 1834 or 1835. It grew finely, and developed a splendid leaf.

"About two years since, while Dr. Parker, with a Chinaman, was here on a visit, on being shown the Canton foliage, it was readily recognized. As the trees had grown here very luxuriantly, and developed a larger leaf than in China, Dr. Parker suggested that our soil might be more congenial to the plant than even China, its native soil.

"Soon after receiving the seed from Canton, a friend sent me another parcel from the South of Asia, with high commendations, that if it would grow here, it would be of essential benefit to the United States for raising silk. It succeeded well, and is more hardy than the white mulberry, very productive in small branches, and a good-sized leaf. I named the latter Asiatic Canton. These two kinds are highly approved of for feeding silk-worms—the Canton for leaf-feeding, and the Asiatic for branch feeding. I have, however, almost every variety which was cultivated during the mulberry speculation—covering, altogether, some ten or twelve acres, besides a large number of young Canton and Asiatic seedlings, of this year's sowing, from seed of my own raising, to enlarge the plantations.

"A few days since, the Rev. William Richards, of the Sandwich Islands, with the young prince, called on me. At a former visit, I had supplied him with Canton mulberry-seed, silk-worms' eggs, and dry mulberry foliage to use in case the eggs should hatch on the passage; but this they did not do until his arrival home. About the same time, other eggs had been received there from China; but the cocoons raised from them were not one quarter as large as the American, and must have required some 10,000 to 12,000 to make a pound of silk, while in America 2,400 to 3,000 would make a pound.

"Mr. Titcomb, also a silk-grower in one of the islands, having the American and Chinese, crossed them: but the crossing