Several unsuccessful attempts have been made to introduce the cultivation of the silk industry into the United States. As the business requires a large amount of cheap labor for a short time during the year, it has not as yet been found profitable. Machines are of little use, except in reeling the silk.
The moth lays its eggs, about five hundred in number, in August or September, and they hatch the following May, just at the time the mulberry comes into leaf. These little caterpillars are hatched and fed in-doors, and they eat like hungry school-boys for a month or more, until they are about three inches long. At this period they sicken and cast their skins, after which they begin eating as eagerly as ever. In about a month, however, the worms stop eating altogether, crawl up on the twigs which are placed on large trays, and begin to spin their cocoons. There are two little openings in the head of the worm, from which comes two thread-like substances resembling glue, from which the silk is made. These stick close together and form a flat thread. The silk-worm by moving its head about, wraps this thread around its body, wrapping from the outside inward, until it has completely inclosed itself in this silken blanket. Then it goes to sleep. If left to itself it would in two or three weeks bore its way out of this silky covering and come forth a feeble white moth. But as the cutting of this hole in the cocoon injures the fibers, only just enough for the next year's crop are allowed to come out. The rest are stifled in a hot oven.
After the outsides of the cocoons are removed they are placed in hot water which softens the gum that is in the silk so that it can be wound off on reels. The silk fiber is all in one piece, and about one thousand feet long. There is always a portion of the cocoon which is too tangled to be wound, and it is made into what is called spun silk. Spun silk is carded like wool. The removal of the natural gum, by boiling in strong soap suds, effects a considerable loss in weight, the cleansing process, however, causing it to take on very beautiful tints. This loss has led to the weighting of silk by mixing cheaper materials with it.
An artificial silk is made from the fiber of the ramie plant which grows in China and Malay. This is sometimes known as China silk. Mercerized cotton has also been treated so as to very successfully imitate silk.
COTTON.
The Plant.—Cotton is one of the most important vegetable fibers, distinguished from all other fibers by the peculiar twist it possesses which makes it especially adapted to spinning. It is cultivated between the twentieth and thirty-fifth parallels north of the equator. This is known as the cotton belt. Within this belt lie the cotton districts of the United States, Northern Mexico, Egypt, Northern Africa, Asia and India.
Although cotton is cultivated mainly for the fiber surrounding the seeds, its by-products, the seeds and stalks, are of great commercial importance, being manufactured into oil-meal, oil cakes, cottolene, etc. There are about fifty species of the cotton plant but only a few are cultivated, the best known and most commonly used being the "American Upland," which is now cultivated in many parts of the world. The two varieties grown in the United States are the "Sea Island" and the "Upland." The former is much more valuable because its fiber is longer. It is cultivated on the islands and low-lying coasts of South Carolina, Georgia and Florida. The latter, while not so valuable, furnishes most of the crop and is grown over a wide area.
The plant grows from seven to ten feet high. The leaves are sprinkled with small black dots. The hollyhock-like flowers are white and yellow when they first open, but two days later they turn a dull red. Surrounding the flowers are three or four cup-shaped green leaves which together are called squares. These remain after the petals have dropped, to serve as a protection to the bolls.
Cotton thrives best in a rich, deep soil with a hot, steamy atmosphere. It should have plenty of moisture while growing and a dryer period during the ripening and gathering of the crop. The most of the cotton crop is planted by the twentieth of May. Six weeks after it begins blossoming the first bolls are ready for picking. This is done by hand, and as the bolls do not all ripen at the same time, it is necessary to go over the field many times, and the picking often lasts until the middle of December. The cotton is gathered into baskets hung from the shoulders of the pickers.
The Preparation of the Fiber.—After the cotton is picked it is taken to the gin which separates the fiber from the seed. Until the cotton gin was invented in 1793, by a Connecticut teacher, then living in Georgia, the cultivation of cotton was not profitable, as one person could only clear the seeds from five or six pounds a day. This machine has revolving teeth which drag the cotton between parallel wires, leaving the seeds behind. With this machine a slave could clean about a thousand pounds in a day. This gave a wonderful impetus to the cotton industry, and its cultivation increased enormously.