1831.] Spanish Highways and Byways. 275 



in the method of using it. I passed the whole day in giving the work- 

 men instruction in the several points wherein I discovered they were 

 most deficient. The next morning the principal inhabitants of the town 

 called on me, from whom afterwards I received many presents of game ; 

 and the priest sent me some potatoes, which are highly esteemed 

 there on account of their rarity. Having taken a lodging (for which 

 I paid 100 rials per week, about a pound English money, which 

 included my diet, wine, desert, a dining-room and bed-chamber, and 

 also a stable for my horses and dogs), I made the acquaintance of several 

 ganaraflos, and commenced treating with them for their piles of wool, 

 intending to prepare it for the French or English market. I employed 

 upwards of forty workmen in this operation, and having sorted about 

 fifty bags, I determined to give a public exhibition of my superior 

 method of sorting and washing. I had taken a complete washing esta- 

 blishment of Seuor Don Barnachea, and a day was appointed. Great 

 was the curiosity manifested by all classes, as the day arrived, to witness 

 an attempt at what they had been, by their own account, a thousand 

 years endeavouring to accomplish. A large concourse of ganarados, 

 merchants, and shepherds, were present ; and the wool, which had been 

 previously sorted, was shewn them, and elicited universal approbation. 

 I then took a few gallons of my prepared liquor, on the efficacy of which 

 I had staked my reputation, and mixing it with the hot water in one of 

 the vats, I selected two bags of the first quality, on which I intended 

 to try my experiment. This sample I submitted to the tests, stirring 

 it gently about with a stick, and when I judged the grease was beginning 

 to separate, I threw it into the basket, through which ran a stream of 

 water. My servant stood with a stick similar to my own, who turned 

 it over in the cold water for a time sufficient to cleanse it, and then 

 landing it, I presented it to the company, as white as snow. My expe- 

 riment was completely successful ; and the wool thus prepared brought 

 from Is. 6d. to 2s. per pound more in the market than wool of a similar 

 quality washed and sorted after the old method. Don Pablo, from 

 whose father I had bought a considerable quantity, rather envying 

 me the gain likely to accrue, paid some attention to the process, and 

 thought he had discovered the secret.. He accordingly bought up 

 several piles, for which I was already in treaty, by out-bidding me, 

 and succeeded, by the excellence of his discovery^, in fixing the grease 

 so completely in the wool, and turning it so many colours, that he was 

 at last obliged to resort to his old system, with a heavy stock and a 

 falling market. 



The Spanish sheep are of two distinct classes one they call Carneros, 

 and is exclusively kept for milking and the butcher. The wool of this 

 class is spun at home, and manufactured into coarse cloth and serge, for 

 the use of the friars and peasantry. The other class is called Merinos, 

 and is kept for the wool alone. It is supposed there are four millions 

 of the latter class in Spain. At the approach of winter they are driven 

 from the mountains in the north, to pasture in the milder climate of 

 Estremadura and the borders of Andalusia, whence they return in the 

 spring to be shorn, and to enjoy the mountain pasturage. I have heard 

 the shepherds say, the Merinos know the time of their departure from 

 the north instinctively, and that they would travel into Estremadura 

 without a conductor. By the regulation of the mesta, there are lands 

 appropriated for the rest and pasture of the flocks during their annual 

 emigration, which in some instances exceeds the distance of four hundred 

 miles. 2 N 2 



