Lest your moist hair defile the ribbons thin, Twist it in knots, and fix it with a pin. PAUSANIAS, a native of Asia Minor, and an inquisitive traveller in the second century, gives the following distinct account of Sericum according to the ideas received among the Greeks in his time. The threads from which the Seres make webs, are not the produce of bark, but are obtained in the following manner. There is an animal in that country, which the Greeks call _Ser_, but which _they_ call by some other name. Its size is twice that of the largest beetle. In other respects it resembles the spiders, _which weave under the trees_. It has also the same number of feet as the spider, namely, eight[39]. In order to breed these creatures, the Seres have houses adapted both for summer and winter. The produce of the animal is a fine thread twisted about its legs. The Seres feed it four years on “panicum.” In the fifth year they give it green reed, of which it is so fond as to eat of it until it bursts, and after this the greatest part of the thread is found within its body[40]. [39] This does not apply to the silk-worm, which has sixteen legs, in pairs: six proper legs before, and ten holders behind. (See Figure 1. Plate iii.) [40] _L._ vi. 26. p. 125. ed. Siebel. The most interesting circumstance, mentioned by Pausanias, is the breeding of the silk-worms within doors in houses adapted both for summer and winter. There seems no reason to doubt the truth of this fact; and, if admitted, it proves, that their country, the Serica of the ancients, lay so far North, or was so elevated, as to have a great difference of temperature in summer and in winter. It is remarkable, that in China the worms are now reared in small houses, and this practice has long prevailed in that country[41]. [41] Barrow’s Travels in China, p. 437, &c. Résumé des Traités Chinois, &c. traduit par Julien, p. 70-72. 77-80. The practice is here shown to have prevailed as early as the fifth century B. C. GALEN recommends silk thread for tying blood-vessels in surgical operations, observing that the opulent women in many parts of the Roman empire possessed such thread, especially in the great cities[42]. He also mentions cloths of silk and gold in his treatise, c. 9. (_Hippocratis et Galeni Opp. ed. Chartier_, tom. vi. p. 533.): [42] Methodus Medendi, l. xiii. c. 22. “Of this kind are the shawls _interwoven with gold_, the materials of which are brought from afar, and which are called Seric or silk.” CLEMENS ALEXANDRINUS, dissuading the Christian convert from luxury in dress, thus speaks: