(36.) Bratting injurious to Wool.—Wool rendered fine by clothing sheep, is never equal to that which owes its perfection to natural causes. The Saxon wool, which is principally produced by artificial means, has been compared, from its inelastic sickly appearance, to grass that has been secluded from the sun. The custom of bratting is therefore not to be recommended, and indeed is now nearly laid aside. Housing sheep with the same intentions is also bad, inasmuch as it must affect their health, and destroy the curl of the fibre. Shelter is however absolutely necessary from extremes both of heat and cold, as temperature has much influence on the covering of animals, and in none more than the sheep.
CHAPTER III.
BRITISH WOOL TRADE.
(37.) Origin of the Wool Trade.—Wool, since Eden closed its gates on our progenitors has been a current coin, an important material, on which has been employed the skill and industry of almost every tribe, and been the means of raising many a petty people to the hard-won dignity of a nation. Man, at first placed in a comfortable temperature, needed little as a defence against the weather; while fashion, then unthought of, or only as a sport, failed to interest the simple-minded races in the cut or texture of the coverings they wore. That the first dresses of mankind were formed from vegetable materials, we have the highest authority for believing; and even at present, the garb of the natives of some of our lately discovered islands, consists of a simple girdle formed from rough-cut reeds. But as the dawn of knowledge smiled upon the savage, and animal sacrifice tutored him in the uncouth rudiments of a coarse anatomy, the superior comfort, even of the untanned hide would be remarked, and the clumsy mantle of the Caffre hordes welcomed as a change. Time would not long elapse till roving dispositions, and the encounter of unstable climates, would show the wanderer the necessity of a fabric better adjusted by shape and pliancy, to the nature of his wants; while the clinging of lock to lock of woolly fibre would plainly tell the superfluous nature of the supporting skin, and point the way to make an ill-closed cloth.
(38.) Invention of Weaving.—Weaving is not absolutely necessary for the manufacture of cloth, since wool will felt, though far from evenly, without the preliminary process of being laid in threads, so that cloth may have been almost coeval with mankind without our being required to assign much mechanical ingenuity to its inventors. But we have tolerably clear evidence in the inspired writings, that weaving was known in the earliest ages, and that it was trusted principally to the women:—Thus Delilah wove Samson's hair when he slept in her lap; and a short time after, it is written, that the mother of Samuel "made him a little coat, and brought it to him from year to year." At a later period, Solomon thus describes a good wife:—"She seeketh wool and flax, and worketh willingly with her hands."[ [5] That garments were in those early ages made of several pieces, joined by needle work, is evident on a perusal of Genesis, xxxvii. 3; Judges, v. 30; and 2 Samuel, xiii. 13; and this plan is allowed to be even more ancient than the weaving of flax. Job, who flourished, or is supposed to have flourished, before the Israelites left Egypt, shows clearly by his words that flannel clothing was then in vogue: "Let me be condemned if I have seen any perish for want of clothing, or any poor without covering; if his loins have not blessed me, and if he were not warmed with the fleece of my sheep;" and that the cloth was woven, and not produced by beating, is evident from his saying, when complaining of his sad estate, "My days are swifter than a weaver's shuttle."
(39.) The early progress of the Wool Trade is veiled in much obscurity, and only to be discovered by seeking for it in a mass of fable, which in many instances enabled the old writers to string together the dry details of history, in a manner suited to the taste and habit of their time. The following may be taken as a specimen. Phryxus, the son of Athamas king of Thebes, fleeing with his sister, Hellé, from their stepmother, and riding upon (carrying with him) a ram which had a golden (valuable) fleece, sought to cross the Dardanelles, when Hellé was drowned, and the sea was ever after called the Hellespont: but Phryxus arrived safely at Colchis, between the Black and Caspian seas, and having sacrificed the ram to Mars, hung the fleece in a temple dedicated to that god. By this the ancients no doubt meant to intimate, either that Bœotia, the birth-place of so many talented Greeks, furnished the people of Colchis with sheep, or that they sent them sums of money in exchange for the wool of Caucasus. That the latter is the more probable, is apparent from Ovid's account of the Argonautic expedition, in which he shows the hardships which Jason encountered in his successful endeavours (B.C. 1225) to bring the golden fleece from Colchis back to Greece—implying the value of the article, and leading us to believe, that the Colchians had, by the aid of severe penalties, long monopolized the growth of wool. Moreover, Mount Caucasus and its neighbourhood form the favoured nursery whence the improved fleece-bearing animals have gradually spread over the world; and as such would be looked upon, at the time I speak of, by adjacent tribes with jealousy and hatred; for where is the nation that can calmly behold a compeer engrossing a hoard of wealth, without struggling to lower their prices by a market of their own?
Thus one country after another became impressed with the advantages to be derived from the husbandry of sheep. Nation after nation improved its agriculture, by the introduction of the animal, till at last the Romans became pre-eminent for their attention to its culture, and to the manufactures of which it is the fruitful source. Generous even to an enemy, and attacking only to enrich the countries they subdued, England may bless the hour which saw the legions of the world's mistress planting the Imperial Eagle on her shores.
Instead of following the progress of the wool trade among foreign nations in later times, the limits of the present work compel me to confine myself to an outline of the British trade from its origin, at the time of the invasion by the Romans, to the present period.
(40.) Introduction of Weaving into Britain.—It is evident from ancient history, that the first inhabitants of all the countries of Europe were either naked, or nearly so, owing to their ignorance of the clothing art. Such, in particular, was the uncomfortable condition of the inhabitants of this island, who are supposed to have used the bark of trees, and to have smeared themselves with unctuous matter, after the manner of other savages, to protect themselves from cold. Some writers are of opinion, that the inner bark of trees alone was employed, and that not till woven into a kind of cloth, such as the South Sea islanders at present make. They continued the abominable practice of anointing their bodies, long after the people of France, Spain, and Germany, were decently clothed, so differently were they situated in regard to intercourse with strangers, and opportunities of acquiring the useful arts. It is impossible to discover with certainty when, or by whom, the custom of wearing clothes was introduced into Britain. Some suppose that the Greeks, and after them the Phœnicians, who visited the Scilly islands, and sometimes the continent of Britain, for trading purposes, first awakened in the breasts of our savage ancestors a desire for comfortable coverings, as both these nations were celebrated for elaborate attention to their attire.