in soap, after which it was put into an acid, and was there prepared for the process of the dye, according to the colour, as desired. The gloss, or dressing. seems to be produced by beating and twisting on a post, which, with the manual labour put upon its finish, it is supposed prevents its tendency to knot.

I asked if the colour of the cocoon, yellow or white, gave any difference of value, or indicated a sickly worm, and the answer was that the colour was casual, and the value the same; that a selection of white or yellow cocoons from which to get eggs would probably produce a like colour; and Mr. Finizio said he had some customers who had so seJeeted and brought him cocoons entirely white; and that for the white ribbons or fabrics, they commanded a greater price of from three to five per cent., though otherwise of equal value.

"I have made many other inquiries and observations on this subject, but which in the limits of a letter cannot be detailed. The eggs are here in market during most of the year, and by being kept in a grotto, or cold damp place, the worm can be produced as required. The sirocco, or hot south wind, is here the greatest enemy of the silkworm, and sometimes suddenly destroys so many of the worms as to require the reproduction of another class from eggs in reserve. They should be sheltered from this wind, and ventilation should be given them from above or by back windows. I think we have sometimes a like south, or south-west wind, which should be guarded against, and which our gardeners call a red wind, from a rust produced by it on peach and apricot trees, which curls up and burns the young leaves, and often kills the trees, and is said to affect the mulberry trees in like manner.

"Paris, April 6th, 1836.—In my last letter from Naples I believe I promised to say something more on the cultivation of silk. I have since travelled through Italy, and espe cially in the silk districts, and also through France, and have visited many of the manufactories in both countries, endeavouring to learn the details of this subject, now so interesting, and, I think, so essential to our country. The limits of a letter will, however, confiue me to a few isolated remarks.

"The weaving of silk after it gets into skeins, is like any other weaving of like character; it is the production of silk, and the habit of growing it, that must be acquired by our country; and it is in this view, a mine of boundless wealth, not second even to the production of cotton. The coun try which so lately surprised Europe by sending eight bales of cotton to its market, and now astonishes the world with its countless thousands, may soon exhibit a like wonder in the production of its silk.

"In Calabria, which is in the south of Italy, the black mulberry is principally used. In the rest of Italy the white mulberry, common to them and to France, is principally used. The north of Italy, that is between the Alps and the Appenines, produces the most and the best silk. In this region, and especially in Sardinia, near Turin, and at Novi, the English and French are competitors in market, to purchase their silk as the best in the world; and yet on the 9th of March,” the snow was one foot and a half deep, and the streets of Novi blocked up like our Cedarstreet! In Calabria the silk is produced by the country people, in their families, and mostly reeled by them. There are very few factories for reeling in the Neapolitan kingdom. In Lombardy, and towards Venice, there are also establishments for reeling, yet the greater part is reeled by the families, in detail, and brought to market in the skein. In Sardinia the cocoons are mostly reeled in establishments. At Novi their reeling establishments are numerous :-I saw one, now erecting, which is a quadrangle two hundred feet square, and appropriated solely to reeling cocoons. They are purchased up from near Milan, and many miles distant. This is admitted to be the best silk in the world. The red mulberry is here principally used, and is known as the Calabria mulberry. Its is described as having a dark fruit; the tree is like our black; and when I called it black mulberry, I was corrected, and told the stain of the fruit was red, and not black, and which gave the character of the tree. The French, in addition to the white mulberry, have a dwarf white, much liked, and getting into use; but, it must be remembered, there is not in France, and scarcely in Italy, a fence, and they do not graze their fields as we do. With our habit of pasturage, the dwarf would be inadmissible. The Chinese mul berry is unknown in Italy. I found only a few young engrafted trees, but no experiments there, to be relied upon, to establish its superior utility. In Italy and in France, the mulberry is generally planted near the houses, along the road sides, by division fences, and often like an open orchard. The trees are formed like a middle-sized apple tree. Its shade does not injure the land. The tree in Italy is usually made to sustain a grape vine, and the field is cultivated for wheat and other crops. There is less dis crimination here than you would imagine in the kind of mulberry. The French have made experiments, especially on the Chinese ; and the opinion seems to be, that the Chinese mulberry will bear to have its leaves twice picked off, and thus produce two crops of silk in one year. As yet, however, there is not much use made of the Chinese mulberry, even here, and the grower of silk cannot

answer as to its virtues ;--but the answer is often given to me, that, as to the quality and the quantity of the silk, it is the same as any other mulberry; and that the quality of the silk depends on the treatment of the worm, and the care and skill in reeling. They pay less attention to the kind of mulberry on which it is fed than we expect. They have also white and use it. Habit directs more in Europe than with us, and therefore I urge that our people make experiments for themselves. They should neither take nor reject any thing too quickly upon European experience. Climate and circumstances may pro duce a different result, and the alleged experiments of Europe may have been incorrectly or inadequately tried.

"Paris, April 12th, 1836.-In my last letter, when speaking of the planting and culture of the mulberry tree, I fear I omitted to add that proprietors of land often cultivate the mulberry tree with a view to profit from the leaves. It is common in France and Italy, to sell the leaves to families, who rear the worms, at a fixed rate; but it is more usual for indigent families to plant a certain number of trees. They furnish the leaves, feed, and take care of the worms, and return to the owner of the land one equal half of the cocoons produced, which is his share of the income, and a most convenient one it is, to be produced from the trees along the road side, and in places which do not injure his agriculture; and this kind of tenating is of immense benefit to the industrious poor.

The French are, like all Europeans, slow in acquiring new habits, or making any changes in their pursuits. From this cause in practice, the different mulberries are not heeded. They have white, from habit, and do not yet use the Chinese mulberry. We have more of the Chinese growing than France and Italy together."

FIRST REPORT OF THE DIRECTORS OF THE 9216 EASTERN COUNTIES RAILWAY. (Read on the First General Meeting held at the London Tavern, 26th September, 1836.)

The Act for the incorporation of this Com pany received the Royal Assent on the 4th of July last, and by one of its provisions, the first General Meeting of the shareholders is appointed to be held within six months after the passing of the Act; but the directors, feeling persuaded that the sooner they could make officially known to the proprietary and the public the actual state and prospects of the undertaking, the sooner it would attain that high place which it is entitled to hold in public estimation,-have called this meeting within less than three months from the date of the Act; on the earliest day, in fact,

which the time unavoidably occupied in organising the establishment of the Company, and in auditing the expenses incurred in its formation, could possibly allow.

Nearly three years have now elapsed since the design of the Eastern Counties Railway was first given to the public, and several preliminary surveys made; but it is not more than ten months since it can be said to have taken any considerable hold on the publie mind. The month of October last was far advanced before a Provisional Committee of sufficient weight was formed for the prosecus tion of the undertaking, and there then re mained but six weeks within which to make all the necessary preparations previous to going to Parliament in the ensuing session. Within this brief space, the whole line of a hundred and twenty-six miles, the longest that is yet in progress in any part of the kingdom, had to be surveyed, and the maps and sections, required by the forms of Par liament, prepared: the whole of the owners and occupiers too, for a breadth of half a mile, had to be canvassed for their assents, that extreme breadth being taken in order to allow ample scope for such alterations as circumstances might afterwards render ex» pedient. Even when the requisite plans, sections, and books of reference, had by extraordinary exertions on the part of the engineers and their assistants, exertions which the Directors honestly believe to be without a parallel in the history of such un dertakings-been deposited in due time, there yet remained much to be done in order to obtain for the undertaking an adequate share of public confidence. Early in November, the chairman and two other members of the Provisional Committee had made a progress through Essex, Suffolk, and Norfolk, for the purpose of personally representing to the leading gentlemen of these counties the claims which the undertaking had to their couns tenance and support; and also of calling public meetings of the inhabitants to investi. gate and decide on its merits: and the des monstrations of local approbation which this deputation were the means of eliciting, were so numerous and decisive, as to leave the Committee in no doubt that they had the hearty concurrence of the counties in their endeavours to carry out the plan to a success ful conclusion. But though the good-will of the counties had certainly been conciliated, the confidence of the monied interests of the country, from whom alone could be expected the bulk of the large capital required for its execution (the largest subscribed during the past year for any railway project), had still to be gained. The various steps taken to this end, the Directors need not stop to detail: it may suffice to state that, by the choice of active and judicious agents, and

without having recourse to any adventitious aids to stimulate the spirit of adventure-by simply making known, far and wide, the sterling merits of the undertaking the greater part of the capital was subscribed before the second reading of the Bill. In point of numbers, the shareholders residing in, or connected with, the counties themselves, bore a fair proportion to those having no local interest in the line; but the amount of capital subscribed for by them was little more than one-twelfth of the whole. Without the powerful assistance, therefore, derived from other and distant parts-from Manchester, Birmingham, Bristol, Bath, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dublin, and, above all, from Liverpool, the opulent and intelligent citizens of which, ever foremost in the encouragement of great enterprises, at once subscribed for upwards of 12,000 shares of the Company's stock; it may with perfect truth be said, that the undertaking must have fallen (for the present at least) to the ground.

Notwithstanding the success which had so far crowned their exertions, the Directors were still but in the midst of their difficulties. A parliamentary opposition had yet to be encountered-an opposition, as it happened, of a more than usually obstinate character, There were two rival lines in the field, both of more recent suggestion than the Eastern Counties Railway, neither of them well suited to the wants of these counties, but both, nevertheless, very respectably supported. There was also a formidable array of dissenting owners and occupiers, headed by gentlemen of great parliamentary influence, and to all appearance irreconcileably opposed to the undertaking.

It was under these circumstances, with no ordinary anxiety, that the Directors proceeded before Parliament, and by no ordinary exertions that they were enabled to maintain their ground there, against the serious opposition with which they were met. The second reading of the Bill in the House of Commons was not carried without a division; and in the Committee, to which it was referred, were several of the most active members of that minority who voted for throwing it out. So strong, however, was the case proved in evidence for the Bill, and in so conciliatory a spirit were the opposing parties met and arranged with out of doors, that in a short time all opposition was at an end, and the Committee unanimously agreed to a report to the House in favour of the measure, which concludes in the following highly recommendatory terms:

"Your Committee think it right to add that, according to the evidence adduced, the Eastern Counties Railway, between the termini, would traverse the most populous and most cultivated parts of the counties through

and that

which i it is intended to be carried, great benefit would be given to trade and agriculture by its adoption."

After the Bill had passed the Commons, several new and powerful opponents, sprung up; but the Directors, by meeting the parties. with the same promptness, and in the same fair spirit, which had carried them successfully through their previous negotiations, effected amicable arrangements with them also, and the Bill was finally passed by the House of Lords, as one, which was now on all hands allowed to have for its object, the accomplishment of a measure of great public utility.

W

The Directors, in giving this brief history of the undertaking, would have been disposed to dwell less on the difficulties they have had to encounter and have overcome, could they by a more reserved course have equally well. justified to their constituency the price at which success has been purchased.

The shareholders will see, in the expedi tion with which the Parliamentary plans, sections, and books of reference were executed

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in the more than usual breadth of country which was surveyed-in the great number of persons that it was requisite to employ for that purpose, at a time when hands for employment of this description were scarce, and their terms of remuneration proportionally high-in the numerous agencies which had to J be put in motion in order to raise so large an amount of capital-in the many opponents 61 who had to be negotiated and arranged with -and in the very short period within which nearly the whole of these things were transit acted; the shareholders will see in all this, reasons sufficient for anticipating a much larger amount of expenditure than would, under less extraordinary circumstances, have certainly sufficed.

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From the balance-sheet annexed it will be d seen that the total receipts of the Company up to the present date amount to 61,815, 2s. 9d. The claims brought against the Company have, by careful revision of these claims, and allowances conceded for prompti payment, been reduced by 23831.; making d the net amount of the expenditure, 36,5617. 19s. 2d.; deducting which from the monies received (61,815. 2s. 9d.), the balance 10 at remaining in hand is 25,8157. 2s. 9d. 9930 When the Directors look to the magnitude of the object, which the sum thus expended

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has been the means of achieving, they think they may fairly congratulate the shareholders upon the general result. In a single session, with Ho

no more delay than the forms of Parliament rendered unavoidable, this Company has obtained its Act of Incorporation;-that for which other proprietaries have had to struggle through several sessions, and to pay twice and thrice as much ;-an Act of Incorporation, too, which secures to them the per-" petual proprietorship of one of the best lines of railway in the whole kingdom, with all the great profits legitimately derivable therefrom.

The Eastern Counties is not only the longest integral line of railway which has yet obtained the sanction of Parliament, but traverses a larger extent of cultivated and highly productive country than any other; those districts from which the immense population of the metropolis derives its chief supplies of agricultural and marine produce.

From the peninsular character, too, of this portion of England, washed as it is on three sides by the German Ocean and the Thames, it is obvious, that a main-trunk line, which follows, as this does, the ancient and longestablished course of traffic, and touches at nearly all the places of greatest business, must draw and keep to itself the great bulk of the carrying trade of the district. Other railways

never cay be interfered with, but this

As a great main line, it must always stand alone-dividing with no other railway, though receiving the tributary contributions of many.

Another novel and important feature of the Eastern Counties line is, that, notwithstanding its great length, there will not, from beginning to end, be a single tunnel.

If at one or two points it goes wider of considerable towns than could be wished, this has arisen from no indifference to the wants of those places, but from the necessity of consulting the general interests of the whole line, and of the majority of those who are to use it, in preference to all minor considerations.

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The Eastern Counties Railway will have completely fulfilled the purpose for which it was designed, if it serve as the great trunk line of this part of the kingdom, from which branches may radiate into as many of the outlaying districts on both sides, as possess traffic enough to pay for this superior means of communication.

Already not less than six railways, branching from the Eastern Counties line, have been projected with apparently fair prospects of success; all of which, when executed, must contribute more or less to swell the profits of this Company, without involving the necessity of any addition whatever to its capital.

The Directors desire particularly to call attention to the Thames Haven Railway, for

which an Act of Parliament was obtained in the last session of Parliament, and which is to branch off from the Eastern Counties at Romford. The capabilities of this line are undeniably great. Were it to do no more than introduce into the heart of Essex a more abundant supply of coal, it would con fer an incalculable advantage on that county, and pay the adventurers well; but should it also become, as its projectors confidently anticipate, the great channel for the conveyance of an article of such universal consump tion as coal to the metropolis, it would be difficult to assign a limit to its value in a financial point of view. The point chosen for its seaward termination offers also such facilities as a steam-packet station, that there seems strong reason to hope for a large accession of passenger-traffic to both railways from this source.

Next in local order, follow the Maldon Witham and Braintree, the Harwich, the Ipswich and Bury, the Beccles Bungay and Harleston, and the Norwich and Leicester, branches, which embrace among them nearly all the principal towns of the three counties, which were necessarily left at a distance in the setting out of the main trunk line, but will be now brought by these branches into immediate and productive connexion with it.

To these branches there is yet another to be added, which, though not projected with a view to the wants of any part of the districts immediately intersected by the Eastern Counties Railway, will in all probability prove one of its most valuable tributaries. The Directors allude to the recently projected line of railway from London to Rochester and Chatham, through Essex; the communication between the opposite sides of the Thames being effected by a short steam-ferry at Tilbury and Gravesend. By taking advantage of the Eastern Counties and Thames Haven lines for about seventeen miles of the entire distance, this railway will be executed for one-fifth of the cost of any line that can be executed along the Kentish side of the river. Although this line takes what may at first sight seem à circuitous course, it will, in fact, be little longer than a straight line between the two termini, and exceed by one mile only the distance by the present high road. The number of passengers to and from those parts of Kent, to which this railway will present the shortest possible communication with the metropolis, exceeds at present one million; and assuming that one-fourth only of this immense passenger-traffic will fall to the share of this railway, this will add 25,0001. per annum to the revenue of the Eastern Counties Railway, from a source never thought of, or taken into account in the original calculations of its promoters.

According to the estimates, which were produced in evidence before the Committee of

the House of Commons, and reported by that Committee to be verified to their satisfaction, the traffic of the Eastern Counties Railway will yield a return of 22 per cent. on the capital required for its formation. The Directors have since tested this result in a variety of ways; but so far from seeing any reason to doubt its accuracy, they incline to think that the real facts of the case would have fully justified even a higher estimate.

No credit whatever was taken in the Eastern Counties Railway estimates for any of the passenger-traffic from transmarine sources, as that traffic was, at best, of a contingent character. But, unless the Directors are greatly mistaken, the traffic from these sources alone will suffice to pay the entire expense of working the line, leaving all the revenue derivable from the home traffic to count as so much clear gain.

The counties of Essex, Suffolk, and Norfolk, stand in such a geographical position as regards the northern continent of Europe, and the eastern coast of Scotland, as to offer the nearest route by railway from all these parts to the British metropolis. Steam vessels from any continental port north of the Texel, or from any port on the east of Scotland, by putting into Yarmouth, which they can now do with the greatest facility at all times of the tide, and landing their passengers there, will enable them to reach London by the Eastern Counties Railway, from fifteen to twenty-four hours sooner than they can now do by water, and, on occasions of contrary weather, even two days sooner. To the steampackets again, from the more southern ports of Rotterdam, Antwerp, Ostend, and Dunkirk, the port of Harwich will present an equally accessible harbour, from which the passengers may, with a proportionate saving of time, proceed to London by the Harwich branch of the Eastern Counties line. Yarmouth and Harwich were, it is well known, formerly the principal packet-stations on the Eastern coast of England, but lost that traffic through the introduction of steamnavigation. It was then found, that by despatching the Hamburgh and other north of Europe mails by steam-vessels direct from the Thames, even though these vessels should not leave the river for eight or nine hours after the mails were made up, the land journey to the outports was saved, and the mails conveyed to their destination in less time, and with more certainty than could be done by steam-vessels from any other point of the coast. But as soon as a railway communication is established with Harwich and Yarmouth, all this advantage will be lost to the Thames. The damage which steam has done to these ports as packet-stations, the same mighty power will yet be the means of amply repairing. By sending off the mails by the railway to Harwich and Yarmouth as soon

as made up, which is not later thair twelve o'clock at night, they will reach these ports by the same hour of the morning at which they now leave the Thames; one half the voyage will be saved; and an entire day, and often much more, gained in the course of transit. And thus, in the same way that the modern steam-vessels supplanted the old sailing-packets, may we surely reckon on seeing the steam-carriages of the Eastern Counties Railway restoring to its former course the passenger-traffic and commercial correspondence, between the British metropolis and the whole of the north of Europe.

The Directors beg, in conclusion, to assure the shareholders that the same spirit of determination which has enabled them to overcome the numerous difficulties which stood in the way of their obtaining the Act for the Incorporation of the Company, will continue in full vigour till every obstacle to the execution of the trust reposed in them has been overcome. Immediately on the Act being obtained, they directed all the necessary mea sures to be taken for enabling the engineer to commence operations with the least possible delay at both ends of the line, in order that the two portions of it likely to be the most productive, namely, the London and Romford, and the Norwich and Yarmouth, might be the soonest completed and opened; and negotiations for the purchase of the houses and lands required, are already in an advanced state. The expenditure on these parts of the line will be heavier than on any other; but in consequence of the considerable balance of the deposits left in hand, it has not been found necessary to make in the first instance a larger call than 17. per share; and as the Directors have no doubt that this call will be responded to with cordial unanimity, the works will be in full progress before any further call is made on the shareholders.

Since the Act was passed, two vacancies have occurred in the list of gentlemen therein nominated, to constitute for a limited time the first Board of Directors; one by the lamented death of Mr. Crawford, and the other, by the resignation of Mr. Tite, who has since, with much advantage to the interests of the Company, been appointed its surveyor. The Liverpool shareholders, who now hold one-third of the entire stock of the Company, having at a late public meeting expressed a strong desire that they should be represented in the Board by two or more of their number, the Directors, considering this desire to be no more than just and reasonable, have, in virtue of the powers given them by the Act, elected two of the largest shareholders in Liverpool, namely, Lawrence Heyworth, Esq., and Richard Hall, Esq., to succeed Mr. Crawford and Mr. Tite. In thus obeying the voice of the large and respectable portion of their constituency who