(

ON THE EFFECT OF CLIMATE IN ALTERING THE QUA

LITY OF WOOL.

Continued from p. 122.

2. Of beat as producing a permanent variation of fleece of the individual sheep.

CONSIDERING the animal fkin in reference to the production of animal filaments, as nearly analogous to soil in respect to vegetable productions, we can easily form an idea of the pofsibility of rendering the one more fertile and productive, as we know with certainty can be done with regard to the other by care and good management; we know that this animal soil, if the phrase will be admitted, naturally loses its productive quality in certain cases, and either ceases to yield any crop at all, or affords only a very scanty crop. This is obviously the case with the human head as age advances; and baldnefs is the necefsary cons: quence. To remove this sterility, and restore the same productive quality to it as at an earlier period, would be a desirable thing. The profits that would accrue from the pofsefsion of such a secret are so obvious, and at the

ne time it seems from analogy to be a thing so attainable, that many have been tempted to pretend that they had discovered the secret of rendering thin hairs thicker, by means of certain unguents and pomatums that they sell at a high price, as infallible cures for this discase; yet baldnefs still prevails among aged persons in the rich, as well as the poorer

clafses, which gives room to suspect that these preparations are either altogether inefficaceous, or nearly

So.

We can conceive also that climate may have such an effect upon this kind of animal soil, as to dispose it to produce a greater or a smaller crop, or to make the same fkin be disposed to produce filaments of altogether a different nature in one case from those it would yield in another. In consequence of this idea an opinion very generally prevails, that if wool bearing animals, are carried from a cold, to a warm climate, the constitution of the creature is so much altered, as to dispose the body to produce there fewer filaments than it did before, and these also of a much coarser texture: In hort to yield a fleece not only much thinner in the pile, but also much more of the nature of hair than wool. This opinion has been so often afserted with confidence by various persons, that I myself for a great many years believed there was no room to doubt the fact. I have since, however, found reason to suspect there is room here for hesitation and doubt; so that farther than the temporary effct of heat upon the filament above explained, I am now inclined to suspend my judgement till facts are farther elucidated.

The first circumstance that induced me to reflect seriously upon the subject, was a hint from Dr Wright of this place, a gentleman well known for his useful botanical researches, who lived many years in Jamaica, and who is a much more attentive observer of things of this nature, than the generality of the inhabitants of those islands. He afsured me

that this was a mere vulgar opinion that had ro foundation in experience for its support. He says that in the West India islands, it is true, there is to be found a breed of fheep, the origin of which he has not been able to trace, that carry very thin fleeces of a coarse fhaggy kind of wool; which circumstance he thinks, may naturally have given rise to the report. But he never observed a fheep that had been brought from England that ever carried wool of the same sort with these native sheep: on the contrary, though he has known them live there several years, these English fheep carried the same kind of close burly fleece that is common in England; and, in as far as he could observe it was equally free from hairs.

But what still more effectually confirmed him in the opinion that it was not the heat of the climate which occasioned the thin hairy fleeces of these native sheep, was, that he observed the same thinnefs of fleece and coarseness of pile among these native fheep, in the flocks that live among the hills there, in many parts of which, the climate is even perhaps colder than the summer heat in England, as it was among those individuals who inhabit the burning plains. nearer the fhore; he therefore attributes this peculiarity to the influence of breed rather than of cli

mate.

In extending our view from Jamaica, we find this opinion of Dr Wright, supported by innumerable facts, that occur occasionally in the course of reading. Of this nature is the fact quoted by Dr Pallas on the authority of Demanent, Bee, vol. xvi. p. 131 that VOL. Xviii.

H H

there are two kinds of sheep in guinea, one of which carries wool, and the other a thin coat of hair only, resembling goat's hair. We also know that the finest wool produced by any sheep hitherto known is that of Persia and Cashiere. And though there be mountains in Persia, that are of a cold temperature, yet there is no evidence, that these fine woolled sheep, never descend into the plains; or that they do not indeed at all times inhabit those parts of the country where pasture can be found for them, even though very hot. In India, it is known there are two breeds of sheep, one of them of the fat rumped sort,-large animals and which are generally supposed to carry thin fleeces and hairy wool; but there is also another breed of very small fheep more generally diffused over the whole of that country, which carries a close pile of wool; though I have not been able to learn, whether it be fine or not; the quality of the wool being very little adverted to in that country. I myself, have seen some fheep from the Cape of Good Hope, with broad fat tails, which carried a close fleece of wool, of a fine pile, but so much intermixed with stitchel hair-the same as is to be found among some of the Shetland fheep and particular breeds in England, as to render it if no use in manufactures. We now also know, in this country, that Spanish fheep carry the very closest fleece of any breed that ever has been seen here. There are theep, natives of this country, which will be allowed to be a colder climate than Spain, whose fleeces are so thin that I will venture to say ten times the number of filaments could be found in the same extent of surface of Spanish theep as on them.

From these considerations I am inclined to doubt the fact, and rather believe the notion has originated in inaccurate observation, and theories of a delusive nature.

From the influence of such theories, mankind have been in general also inclined to believe that the fleece of fheep, as well as the fur of other animals, is not only invariably thinner in warm climates than in colder regions, but that it is thinner in summer than in winter; even in this country; without being at the trouble of satisfying themselves experimentally on this head, which might easily be done. Na ture, say they, is so beneficent to all her creatures, that the renders the fur closer in winter than in summer, in order to enable the animal to resist the rigorous cold of that climate; and because the idea is beautiful, the fact is admitted without proof. Nature, it is indeed true, has provided, with that beneficence so truly conspicuous in all her works, a much warmer covering for fur bearing animals in winter than in summer; but not by the means of thickening the fleece at that period, but of lengthening it only, which answers precisely the same purpose*. The sheep, if left to itself, drops its old fleece in the beginning of June, when the warm weather

*We are too apt to judge of other animals by ourselves, without adverting to the infinite power of nature to produce the same effects by means extremely diversified. Some animals are endowed with a power of resisting cold to an astonishing degree without any covering. The naked toes and legs of birds are a strong illustration of this. Were a man to grasp with his naked fingers a frozen branch for some hours, as they do, the fingers would be entirely lost, though of a size an hundred times larger than the bird's toes.