Rollo in Rome | Page 7

to see.
"I am glad we are going to have postilions, uncle George," said Rollo,
as they were getting into the coach.
"Why?" asked Mr. George.
"Because I like the looks of them," said Rollo; "and then we always go
faster, too, when we have postilions. Besides, when there is a seat for a
driver on the coach, it blocks up our front windows; but now our

windows are all clear."
"Those are excellent reasons--all of them," said Mr. George.
The postilions did indeed drive very fast, when they once got upon the
road. There was a delay of half an hour, at the gate of the city, for the
examination of the passports; during which time the postilions, having
dismounted from their horses, stood talking together, and playing off
jokes upon each other. At length, when the passports were ready, they
sprang into their saddles, and set the horses off upon the run.
The road, on leaving the gates, entered a wide and beautiful avenue,
which was at this time filled with peasants coming into town, for that
day was market day in Naples. The people coming in were dressed in
the most curious costumes. Multitudes were on foot, others rode
crowded together in donkey carts. Some rode on the backs of donkeys,
with a load of farming produce before or behind them. The women, in
such cases, sat square upon the donkey's back, with both their feet
hanging down on one side; and they banged the donkey with their heels
to make him get out of the way so that the diligence could go by.
The country was very rich and beautiful, and it was cultivated every
where like a garden. Here and there were groves of mulberries,--the
tree on which the silk worm feeds,--and there were vineyards, with the
vines just bursting into leaf, and now and then a little garden of orange
trees. In the mean time the postilions kept cracking their whips, and the
horses galloped on at such a speed that Rollo had scarcely time to see
the objects by the road side, they glided so swiftly by.
"Won't the silk worms eat any kind of leaves but mulberry leaves?" he
asked.
"No," said Mr. George, "at least the mulberry silk worms will not.
There are a great many different kinds of silk worms in the world; that
is, there are a great many different kinds of caterpillars that spin a
thread and make a ball to wrap up their eggs in, and each one lives on a
different plant or tree. If you watch the caterpillars in a garden, you will
see that each kind lives on some particular leaf, and will not touch any

other."
"Yes," said Rollo, "we found a big caterpillar once on the caraway in
our garden, and we shut him up in a box, in order to see what sort of a
butterfly he would turn into, and we gave him different kinds of leaves
to eat, but he would not eat any but caraway leaves."
"And what became of him at last?" asked Mr. George.
"O, he turned into a butterfly," said Rollo. "First he turned into a
chrysalis, and then he turned into a butterfly."
"There are a great many different kinds of silk worms," said Mr.
George; "but in order to find one that can be made useful, there are
several conditions to be fulfilled."
"What do you mean by conditions to be fulfilled?" asked Rollo.
"Why, I mean that there are several things necessary, in order that the
silk worm should be a good one to make silk from. In the first place,
the fibre of the silk that he spins must be fine, and also strong. In the
next place, it must easily unwind from the cocoon. Then the animal
must be a tolerably hardy one, so as to be easily raised in great numbers.
Then the plant or tree that it feeds upon must be a thrifty and hardy one,
and easily cultivated. The mulberry silk worm has been found to
answer to these conditions better than any hitherto known; but there are
some others that I believe they are now trying, in order to see if they
will not be better still. They are looking about in all parts of the world
to see what they can find."
"Who are looking?" asked Rollo.
"The Society of Acclimatation," replied Mr. George. "That is a society
founded in Paris, and extending to all parts of the world, that is
employed in finding new plants and new animals that can be made
useful to man, or finding some that are useful to man in one country,
and so introducing them into other countries. They are trying specially
to find new silk worms."

"There are some kinds of