But the silkworms would not cooperate--they refused to eat the leaves of the red mulberry tree. In 1621, the white mulberry was imported from China. But still the silk industry languished, this time it was said, for want of cheap labor. In the beginning the care of the silkworms was held to be specially suitable work for children. The mulberry trees were kept like a low hedge so that children could pick the leaves to feed the worms. This is probably where the singing-game originated: "Here we go 'round the mulberry bush, mulberry bush--." Tradition said that two boys, "if their hands be not sleeping in their pockets, could care for six ounces of seed from hatching till within fourteen days of spinning." After that three or four helpers, "women and children being as proper as men," were needed to assist in feeding the worms, airing, drying, cleansing and "perfuming" them. Now, under the Commonwealth, the silk industry was again being stimulated. But all was in vain--the colonists had their minds set on raising tobacco and they could not be diverted. _ROADS_ As a rule the settlers of the Northern Neck built their homes on the banks of rivers and creeks. Since travel was by boat there was little need at first for roads through the forest. The Indians traveled through the woods over narrow footpaths not much over twenty inches wide. These had been made originally by animals. Now they were traveled by both Indians and wild beasts. These paths usually ran along high ground or where there was little undergrowth and few streams to cross. When it was necessary for settlers to penetrate the interior they used these Indian and animal paths, or cut new paths and blazed the trees so that the blazes stood out clear and white in the forest. Northumberland County records mention a horse path "wch leadeth from Wicocomoco to Chickacoon buttin upon the north west side of an Indian field knowne by the name of Fairefield." There was a cart path near the Corotoman river "knowne by the name of Morratico & Wiccomcomico Path." Early land patents mention other paths, horse paths and Indian paths. Rolling-roads were narrow roads cut through the woods over which hogsheads of tobacco fitted with axles could be rolled or drawn. In this way inland plantations could send their tobacco to wharves and warehouses on the waterfront for shipment overseas. The parish church, court-houses, ferries and ordinaries became the focal points that led from crude interplantation lanes. In 1658 the General Assembly appointed surveyors whose responsibility it was to clear general ways from county to county. These roads were to be forty feet wide and the surveyors were to see that the citizens kept them up. This last order was hard to enforce because for a long time the planters had little interest in highways on land. _MARKETS_