<^2 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



tnent there not permitting the wool dealer, or 

 even the clothier to witness the final result of 

 the process. The wool buyer 



itgncttltural J^rpovt, 



For the District of J\'iagara — higust, lS2i. 



The harvest this season has proved the most , countries, and the wool sort.r 



fleece were equally unarquaintcil .villi Uieciotn 



in the distani 

 who divided the 



abundant that has been known lor many years rr.i v i u-„„ .i^.hior =ni,i h.s 



The crops of wheat, rye, barley, oats, and peas, [ manufacture. The Yorkshire^ clothier sold h.s 

 are nearr; all well housed, /he Indian corn is goods in an undressed, and often ,n an undyed 

 a fine crop.-Thepotatoe fields promise to y.eld I state; they were bought and fi^.^hed by the 

 in general, not only a largo quantity, but also to , cloth merchant, who was formerly unacquainted 

 improve in qual.tv bv the dryness of the weath-j with the previous processes of the manulaclure 

 er Those ihritVv persons who have sown flax- 1 or the qualities of wool. In a promiscuous lot 

 seed, will be well repaid; the land has not j of undressed cloth honsrhl at the same price, 

 yielded such an increase for ten years past, and apparently of the same quality in the rough 

 The turnip crops will do well, if aided by mod- 1 state, if some pieces were hnished muci l^etter 

 erate refreshing showers at short intervals. ' and softer than others, it was attributed (o lucky 

 The kitchen garden this season is not very ' chance, the patron divinity of the ignorant — 

 promising. The fruit garden and orchard bids Mr. Bake^vell_ proved that the hardness ol Eng- 

 fairfor an average crop — a few early pears and |ish wools does 



apples are selling here, ripe, at Is. 3(1. to 5s. fid. ! fnnH nr bvph pntirelv on the breed : it is the 

 per bushel. 



P. S. A merchant in Niagara bought 100 

 bushels wheat at 3s. 9d. last week, he now only 

 offers 3s. 1 l-2d. Fine flour in the Quecnslon 

 and Niagara markets, sold last Saturday at 10s. 

 and lis. 3d. the 112 lbs.— This depression aris- 

 es from the fall of produce in the Montreal 

 market. (lHcensto7i, Aug. 31, 1021. 



From Rces'' Cyclopedia. 



WOOL. 



[Continued from page 77.] 



The. softness of fine clothing -^-ool is next in im- 

 portance to the fineness of the fibre, though it 

 has been loo little attended to in the culture of 

 English wool. This quality is nol dependent 

 on the fineness of the fibre ; it consists in the 

 jieculiar feel, which approaches to that of silk 

 or down, but in which the wool of all European 

 sheep is inferiour to that of Eastern Asia, or to 

 the wool of the V'icunna, or Lama of Peru and 

 Chili. In foreign European wools there are 

 different degrees of this propeity, where the 

 fibre is equally fine. In our native English 

 wools, the like diflerence exists between the 

 softness of wool possessing the same degree nl 

 fineness, but groivn in dificrent districts. In the 

 harder wool, the fibre is elastic and hard to the 

 touch, and cloth made from it has the same 

 hard feel; it is also more loose in its texture, 

 and the surface of the thread is generally more 

 bare. The dilTeronce in the value of cloth 

 from tivo kinds of wool, equally fine, but one 

 distinguished tor its softness, and the other for 

 the contrary quality, is such, that with the same 

 process and expen>e of maniificture, the one 

 will make a clolli more valuable than the other 

 from twenty to twenty-five per cent. 



Though the English woolen manufactures 

 hail been carried on for a long period, the 

 cause of this diiference in the cloths made from 

 wool equally fine was but very imperfectly 

 known till the present century. Mr Robert 

 iJaUewell, then of Wakefield, in Yorkshire, first 

 directed the attention of wool-growers and man- 

 ufacturers to this subject in a work entitled 

 " Observations on the Injluence of Soil and Cli- 

 .nuiic on U'ool.^'' The reason why the manufac- 

 turers remained so long ignorant respecting it, 

 arose, he observed, from the manner in which 

 the woolen trade had been carried on in York- 

 shire, the great seat of the manufacture of the 

 English clothing wool, the division of employ- 



ed, i food, or even entirely on the breed ; it is 



effect of soil acting on the surface of the fleece. 

 The wools from chalk districts, or light, dry, 

 calcareous snils, have the natural yolk or 

 moisture absorbed by the particles of oalcare- 

 ous earth that penetrate the fleece, and the wool 

 is thereby rendered h.ird. The same effect is 

 produced on a skin where lime is used ; it may 

 also be produced by keeping wool for a longer 

 or shorler time in a <lry temperature; and 

 when wool has been so dried, no process will 

 restore it to its pristine softness. On the con- 

 trary, wools grown on rich, loamy, argillaceous 

 soils are always dislingiiished for their softness. 

 The quanlily of grease or yolk in the fleece 

 has a considerable degree of influence on the 

 softness of Merino wool, the pile being so close 

 as in a considerable degree to prevent the earthy 

 particles from penetrating the fleece ; but in all 

 English fleeces the wool is grown thinner on 

 the skin, and admits the more easy access of 

 the absorbent particles. Exposure to the di 



grown on a very small sheep ; close to the skin 

 there is a wool as sofi as the softest fur; Ihis is 

 covered by long coarse hairs growing through 

 it. ^Vhcn the wool is once shorn, the separa- 

 tion of the hairs from the sol't wool is a uork of 

 extreme difificully ; hiil on the back of the sheep 

 we '.e|:.-ve the separali' n can be maile with 

 great ease. The softness of the Indiiin wool is 

 not even distantly approached in the very soft- 

 est Merino fleeces from Saxony and Spam ; — 

 this may be proved by comparing the finest 

 Cassimere cloth from Saxony wool ^vith the 

 shauls or shawl cloth iVom India. The ancient 

 Tarentine sheep, called by way of excellence, 

 molles oves, [soft or fine sheep] were treated 

 with peculiar care by the Romans, and clothed 

 in skins, which we believe were intended to 

 preserve the softness of the wool, as it is still 

 practised in some parts of Asia for that purpose. 

 In Europe no experiments have been made di- 

 rectly to improve the softness of the wool, 

 though wool, ap|)roaching in softness to that of 

 India wouKI be a most valuable acquisition to 

 our manulactures. To be convinced of this it 

 need only be staled that the yarn from Indian 

 wool has been sold here at three guineas per 

 pound, not on account of the superiour fineness 

 of the spinning, but for the softness of the wool. 

 For coarse goods, indeed, such as blankets, car- 

 pets, and cloths called diifiields, raised with a 

 hairy pile, a considerable degree of hardness 

 or elaslicity of fibre is an advantage ; but in 

 all the finer articles of the woollen or worsted 

 manufacture, the opposite quality is of great 

 value. 



The felting property is intimately connected 



with its softness; the softest wools have the 



greatest tendency to felt, and the hard wools 



are greatly defective in this respect. The felt- 



i inn- quality appears to depend on a peculiar 



reel rays of a summer sun has also a tendency slruclure of the surface of the fibres, by which 

 to injure the soft quality of the wool. We shall they are disposed to move in one direction 

 have occasion to refer to the methods reconri- „.^„yg readily than another. This is percepti- 

 mcnded by Mr. Bakewell to improve the soft- i,|(, in drawing a hair through the fingers, first 

 ness of wool on soils naturally unfavourable to ; Oo^ (|,e encHo the point and again from the 

 its growth. ! poi„t (0 the end ; in one direction the hair teols 



Of fine European wools, the Saxony general- pprfeclly smooth, in the other direction a pecu- 

 ly possesses a greater degree of softness than u^,. roughness is felt. The cause of this is 

 the Spanish, which we believe to be owing to supposed to be owing to the surface of the fi- 

 the sheep being less exposed to the action of i,^^, haying laminai like the scales of fishes, 

 light and heat. The native fine Italian wool, ^jd, ,he edges laid over each olher. Indeed 

 before the introduction of the Merino race, pos- j„ ,|^p (j|j,.gj ^f g^me animals wc have observ- 

 sessed a considerable degree of softness, judging pd with a powerful microscope, lliat the sur- 

 from wools which we have seen from thence, ; c.,(.g jg composed of lamina; laid over each oth- 

 er, resembling llie arrangement of the leaves 



but they were deficient in soundness, and not 

 true grown. The wools on the chalk soils 

 in the southern and eastern sides of England, 

 are generally hard, except, as in Kent, where 

 the chalk is covered by thick argillaceous beds. 



of the artichoke. On this pro[iorty the process 

 of hat making depends ; the short libres of the 

 t'lir being repeatedly compressed, move and in- 

 terlock with each other, so as to (orm a com- 



Noitingham forest, Chamwood forest, in Leices- .f substance ; this motion is further aided by 



tershire, and some parts of Shropshire, produc- 

 ed not the finest, but the softest wools in Eng- 

 land before the lale enclosures. The Cheviot 

 hills in Cumberland, are pastured by the finest 

 wooled English sheep, but their fleece possess- 

 es a degree of softness exceeding any from the 

 other districts of England, and they are render- 

 ed soft, by artificial means, which we shall de- 

 scribe. It is still somevvbat uncertain whether 

 Ibere are two distinct breeds of sheep from 

 which the fine shawl wool of India is grown, — 

 or whether one species of the animal that 

 yields it, is not to be crossed by the goal. The 

 fleeces from India, which wc have seen, are 



heat and moisture. A similar process lakes 

 place to a cerUin degree in cloth subjected to 

 the strokes of the fulling mill; the iibres co- 

 here, and the [liece contracts in length and 

 breadth, and its te.xlure is rendered more com- 

 pact and uniform. This process is essential to 

 the beauty and strength of woollen cloth ; and 

 it is observed that the softer wools felt in much 

 le.ss time than the harder, and form a closer 

 pile on the .'surface of the cloth; on which ac- 

 count it is a common practice to mix a certain 

 quanlily of soft wool with the hard, to enable 

 the former to felt with more f.icility. 



