HIDES 



AND SKINS 



Improvement 

 in Trade. 



D.E.P., 

 iv.,248-51, 

 605-15. 

 Leather. 



Ancient 

 Knowledge. 



Horse 

 Trappings. 



Leather. 



India behind 

 the Times. 



Complete 

 Revolution. 



Advance of 

 Science. 



ports recorded manifest a great improvement in tanned hides, amounting 

 to an increase of 63'7 per cent, in quantity and 87'6 per cent, in value on 

 the figures for 1904-5. The actual value of the hides exported in 1905-6 

 amounted to Es. 1,54,80,070, and of the skins to Es. 2,11,04,250, giving 

 a total of Es. 3,65,84,320 ; and in 1906-7, hides Es. 1,72,96,337, and skins 

 Es. 2,72,16,204, or Es. 4,45,12,541. 



LEATHER AND LEATHER MANUFACTURES. Internal Industries. 

 Although the objection to taking life is held very strongly by 

 Buddhists and to a less extent by Hindus, it has not seriously opposed 

 the growth of a trade in leather and leather manufactures. From the 

 most ancient times in India, furs, skins, and leather have been used, and 

 apparently to much greater extent than is the case to-day. Speaking of 

 the frontier of India, Stein (Ancient Khotan, 1907, 345 et seq,) de- 

 scribes in great detail the ancient records, correspondence, etc., written 

 on leather and wood, which he discovered during the exploration of the 

 Niya site, and some of which bear the date of the 3rd century A.D. " The 

 finish given," he says, " to the leather of these ancient documents indi- 

 cates extensive practice in the preparation of the material." Leather, 

 when once prepared, was thus not objected to by the early Buddhists of 

 Khotan, any more than are the leather straps of the sacred books used by 

 the orthodox Brahmans of to-day, in Kashmir and India generally. Book- 

 binding in leather Stein regards as dating back to the Hindu period of 

 Kashmir, and thus long anterior to the Muhammadan conquest. Many 

 of the stucco statuary and fresco paintings of Ancient Khotan show 

 personages riding on horses and camels, the saddles and trappings of which 

 differ but little from those in use to-day ; and the riders are often depicted 

 wearing high boots of black leather richly embroidered in gold and silk. 

 These circumstances may thus be accepted as indicative of an ancient 

 knowledge in leather. 



It is not contemplated to deal here in detail with the contrivances and 

 materials of leather manufacture. The various provincial Governments 

 of India have recently had prepared a series of publications entitled 

 Monographs on the Tanning and Working in Leather. These, so far as they 

 go, are admirable publications, and will be found to afford much useful 

 information regarding the manufacture and utilisation of leather in India. 



Leather. It may very truly be said that no large industry has changed 

 more rapidly and completely than that of leather. Every axiom of the 

 craft and even the reputation of leather itself has changed completely, for 

 artificial leather is now a regular commodity. But speaking figuratively, 

 India may be said to be many years behind the times. From being an 

 industry in which time and capital had to be locked up almost in- 

 definitely, tanning may now be spoken of as characterised by a 

 rapidity of production and a turnover hardly equalled by any other 

 branch of manufacturing enterprise. From being essentially a craft for 

 manual labour, every stage in the tanning of leather and the preparation 

 from it of the most artistically finished boots and shoes are accomplished 

 by complex and intricate machinery. And what is even more significant, 

 the countries that have responded most energetically to the discoveries 

 of science and of mechanical skill have usurped or are usurping the leather 

 trade of the world. Instead of it being now found necessary to retain 

 hides and skins for a protracted period, subject to the slow action of some 

 vegetable tanning material, rapid chemical methods (by mineral salts, 



636 



