MULBERRY.
Mure, FR. Tut, Hum.
Maul-beere, . . GER. I Mora, . . . IT., Sr.
Species of the Morus or mulberry trees and their fruit. In the Panjab, there are red and white mulberries, and two sorts of each colour ; one is a small oval, being rather sweet, but a most miserable fruit. The other, called shahtut, is a very long, narrow fruit, looking almost like a caterpillar, either greenish-yellow or red-black in colour ; this fruit is somewhat better than the first kind ; it is very sweet, but has no flavour. The shahtut, or royal mulberry of Kashmir, is a fine large subacid fruit ; it is dried and made into flour ; the bread from it is nutritious and fattening. The hill mulberry, or kiam, is the Morns serrata.
Tut or karun is the Morus Indica, a tree of fast growth, attaining its full size iu 20 years, when it becomes useful.
The leaves of the red and white mulberry trees form the food of the Bombyx mori, yielding the silk of commerce. The Philippine mulberry is the Morus multicaulis of botanists. In Birbhum, mulberry gardens are innumerable, dotting the country in patches of a dark-green colour.
The white species in China bears but little fruit. The Chinese recommend the dung of fowls and ducks as a manure to produce abundant foliage for silk-worms. Species of mulberry have been cultivated for long ages in China. Morns Indica,
M. atropurpurea, M. rubra, M. alba, M. tartarica, and M. nigra are all grown, and many varieties have been produced by cultivation, such as the hill mulberry, the golden mulberry, and the fowl mulberry.
Mulberry trees constitute the wealth of the Druse, Maronite, Mutawali, Ansari, and other tribes of Syria.
In the United States of America it is con sidered that an acre should support 700 to 1000 trees, producing when four years old, 5000 lbs. of leaves fit for silk-worm food. On this quantity of leaves, 140,000 worms can be reared, from which eggs at a net profit £80 to £240 per acre will be 'obtained the work of one person. Mulberry trees have been largely cultivated in California ; in 1870, to 7 or 8 millions, and in one year £700 were cleared from 3i acres, the working expenses having been £90.
Mulberry bark, the Sang-ken - peh - p' of the Chinese ; a silky fibre is extracted from the bark.
Mulberry epiphyte. Sang - shang - ki - sang, CHIN. An epiphyte so called grows on the mul berry trees of China, the woody branches of which are highly prized by . the Chinese, and highly adulterated in consequence.
Mulberry paper. Pi-chi, CHIN.—Smith, D7. M. Ch.; Von Mueller.