[Illustration: FEEDING THE SILK WORMS.]
[Illustration: CLEARING THE COCOONS.]
The culture and manufacture of Silk, appears originally to have been
confined to the Empire of China, and even at the present time, no
country produces this useful material in such large quantities, or
of so fine a description. When silk was first brought into Europe,
so little was known of its origin, that the most absurd tales were
told respecting it; by some it was said to be a kind of fleece, which
adhered to the branches of trees; by others, the bark of the tree
itself, and by another party, the production of a flower.
The scarcity and consequent value of silk, when it was first introduced
at Rome, may be estimated by the fact, that more than two hundred
years after that time, the Emperor Aurelian refused his Empress a
garment of this material, on account of its immense price, twelve
ounces of gold being the charge for one pound of Silk. It was not
till the year 552, that the eggs of the insect, by which the silk is
produced, were brought into Europe. Two monks employed as missionaries,
had succeeded in penetrating into the Chinese Empire, and having
obtained a thorough knowledge of the whole process of rearing the
silk-worm, and manufacturing the silk, they on their return, repaired
to Constantinople, and gave an account of their enterprise to the
Emperor Justinian. Induced by the offer of a great reward, they once
more returned to China, and succeeded, after many efforts, in eluding
the vigilance of that suspicious people, and bringing to Constantinople
a number of the eggs of the silk-worm, concealed in the head of a
walking-cane; these were hatched by the heat of a hot-bed, and being
afterwards carefully fed and attended to, the experiment, which had
cost these enterprising men so much toil, was perfectly successful, and
the cultivation of the silk-worm became very general over the whole of
Greece. In the year 1146, we still find the management of these useful
creatures, and the manufacture of their spoils, in Europe, confined to
the Greek Empire.
In 947, Roger, the first King of Sicily, invaded Greece, and having
sacked the cities of Athens, Thebes, and Corinth, led into captivity
a considerable number of silk-weavers, whom he forcibly settled at
Palermo, obliging them to instruct his subjects in the art, and in
twenty years, the Sicilian silks are said to have attained great
excellence, from the variety of patterns in which they were wrought.
The manufacture of this important article, gradually spread through
the whole of Italy and Spain, but it was not until the beginning of
the sixteenth century, in the reign of Francis the First, that it was
introduced into France. In 1554, while its manufacture was yet but
little known in England, a curious law was passed by the tyrannical
Mary, for the purpose of assisting the consumption of home productions,
by which it was enacted, "that whoever shall wear silk, in or upon his
or her hat, bonnet, or girdle, scabbard, hose, shoes, or spur-leather,
shall be imprisoned during three months, and forfeit ten pounds,"
making, however, a few exceptions in favour of persons of distinction.
The manufacture of stockings from silk, appears about this time to have
been making some progress, although, in this country at least, they
were considered a peculiar rarity, for that luxurious and expensive
Prince, Henry the Eighth, was obliged to wear cloth hose, except when,
by great chance, he was able to obtain from Spain, a pair of silk
stockings for gala days.
The Broad-Silk manufacture in England, had its origin in the following
occurrence. In the year 1585, the Duke of Parma, governor of the
Netherlands, then in the possession of Spain, having taken the city of
Antwerp, where a large and flourishing manufactory existed, consigned
it during three days, to unchecked plunder and destruction: the ruin
of this noble city was a death-blow to the commerce of Flanders, and
its flourishing manufactures were dispersed over different countries.
A large portion of the manufacturers and merchants, employed in the
silk trade, took refuge in England, where they ultimately settled, and
taught the art they had imported. For many years, however, foreign
goods were preferred to those of English make, but still improvements
were constantly and steadily taking place, and, at the present time,
the fabrics of this country are fully equal, if not superior to those
of any other nation.
A curious occurrence, showing the perfection to which the English
fabric has arrived, took place in 1824. A French manufacturer came over
to England, and settled in London; a feeling of jealousy seems to have
arisen against him, and it was broadly hinted that his manufactory was
merely a cloak for the purpose of smuggling French silks. An inquiry
was instituted, and his premises searched, when thirty-seven pieces
of goods were seized, and condemned as foreign; and it was only after
producing the individuals by whom they had actually been made, that he
was able to remove the impression that they had been smuggled.
In 1685, the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, and the persecution of
the protestants in France, compelled many merchants, manufacturers and
workmen to take refuge in England. Of these, a large number who had
been employed in the silk manufacture resorted to Spitalfields, and at
the present time, descendants of these emigrants may be found on the
spot, engaged in the same employment. About the end of the sixteenth
century, the Rev. William Lea, of St. John's College, Cambridge,
invented a machine for the purpose of knitting stockings, by which the
work was so much improved that vast quantities were exported, and their
being of English manufacture was considered, in foreign countries,
as a recommendation of their good qualities. About the same time,
Henry the Fourth of France was making great exertions to extend the
cultivation and manufacture of silk in his empire. To attain this end,
he offered every facility to enterprising men, and, as an extraordinary
inducement, proffered patents of nobility to such large manufacturers
as should support their establishments successfully for the period of
twelve years. He also extended the cultivation of the worm over the
whole of France; but, probably on account of the climate, was obliged
to abandon his plans in all but the more southern departments.
The success of the French king caused, at the time, many attempts to
breed the worms to be made in England, but they all appear to have been
unsuccessful, and the same result attended experiments made in our
American colonies. In the year 1825, a company was formed, entitled
'the British, Irish, and Colonial Silk Company;' about eighty acres of
ground were purchased near Michelstown, in the county of Cork, and the
whole were planted with white mulberry-trees. The rearing of the worms
was confided to an experienced foreigner, Count Dandolo, but, from
some reason or other, the undertaking was abandoned. The cause of such
repeated failures is not thoroughly understood; the severity of the
climate has been assigned as a reason, but silk has been successfully
produced in some parts of Prussia, and the climate of Pekin, in China,
is colder than that of Scotland. But whatever success might attend an
experiment of the sort, it is clear that, in a mercantile point of
view, the project would never succeed, on account of the number of
hands that would be required, and the higher rate of wages. In several
parts of the East Indies, the silk-worm has been introduced, as might
have been expected, with complete success; and, in Bengal alone, the
factories find employment for upwards of two hundred thousand persons.