EAST OF THE MISSISSIPPI KIVER. 23 



leather. * * * Their sheep yield good increase and bear good 

 fleeces ; but they shear them only to cool them." 



Wolves had for years been destructive to the sheep, and numerous 

 statutes provided rewards for their extermination, of which one enacted 

 in 1U97 is a sample: "That whereas it is too evident that wolves do 

 greatly increase, and are very distructive to the increase of most sorts 

 of useful creatures in this country/ 7 it was provided that 300 pounds of 

 tobacco be given for each one killed. 



Notwithstanding the assertions of Beverly that the Virginians de- 

 pended upon the mother country for clothing, and made no use of wool 

 save to take it from the backs of the sheep to cool them, there is not 

 wanting evidence that domestic or homespun manufactures were in- 

 creasing, so much so that in 1708 Edmund Jennings, deputy governor 

 of Virginia, wrote to the home government that the consumption of 

 imported clothing was diminishing, and the manufacturing spirit of the 

 colonists increasing, and he hoped the English merchants would so far 

 see the general interest of the nation as well as their own as to send in 

 continued supplies of clothing 



which will be the only effectual means to take off the inhabitants of this country 

 from going on woolen and linen manufactures of their own. It was necessity that 

 forced them at first upon this course, but the benefits they have found by it, in the 

 late scarcity of goods and the experience they have gained therein, seems to have 

 confirmed in them too great an inclination to continue it, insomuch that this last 

 year, 111 some parts of the country, the planting of tobacco has been laid aside and 

 the improvement of the manufactures of cotton, woolen, and linen followed with an 

 unusual alacrity and application. 



An English writer who had traveled in America, and more particu- 

 larly in Virginia and Georgia, observed, in 1767, that the wool of North 

 America was better than the English, at least in the southern colonies; 

 that it was of the same kind with the Spanish wool, or curled and friz- 

 zled like that, and might be rendered as fine by the same management: 



Sheep likewise maintain themselves in the southern colonies without cost or trou- 

 ble throughout the year. They have already made cloth, worth 12 shillings a yard, 

 which is as good as any made of English wool. Some of their wool has been sent to 

 England, where it sold for the best price. If the Spaniards should manufacture their 

 own wool, England may be supplied from America. 



This statement was overdrawn as to the quality of Virginia wool. 

 It certainly was not as fine as Spanish wool, nor was it as good as the 

 English, but it was of medium fineness and susceptible of improve- 

 ment. There were some superior sheep on the plantations of opulent 

 farmers or planters, some that had been brought over from England in 

 trading vessels, others that had been brought from the West Indies; 

 but as a rule the sheep were very indifferent, white, black, and piebald, 

 yielding wool of a very varied quality and light in the fleece. Just be- 

 fore the war of the Ee volution more attention was given to sheep and 

 slight improvement began. 



