THE FUR, LEATHER AND HIDE TRADES 75 



continue to expand. 62 The native home of these sheep is not Persia, 

 but Turkestan. The current belief that the skins are obtained from 

 the unborn lambs by killing their mothers is without foundation, but 

 it has been said that to get the pelt with the curl and luster in its best 

 condition it must be taken within three or four days after birth. To 

 kill the high-priced ewe and thus stop further reproduction, in order 

 to get the tiny lambskin, would make these furs even very much more 

 expensive then they now are. The United States is a heavy importer of 

 these pelts from Turkestan, 1,500,000 per annum, worth $14,000,000, 

 as reported in 1921, while a few years ago Leipzig alone was import- 

 ing 2,500,000 per annum. Prices of pelts advanced 180 per cent from 

 1895 to 1913, brought $12 during the World War and thereafter again 

 advanced 140 per cent. 63 



The chinchilla rabbit has been greatly exaggerated as a profitable 

 fur-farm animal, perhaps because of confusion with the wild chinchilla 

 of South America, whose fur is much more valuable, but which does 

 not belong to the rabbit family. "As with all domestic rabbits, chin- 

 chillas must be bred for both meat and fur to combine the returns 

 from the two commodities and thus derive the maximum profit on 

 the labor and capital invested." 64 



Turning now to hides and skins of animals other than fur-bearers, 

 and to leather and leather goods manufactured therefrom, we find an- 

 other vast industry based upon mammals. The great majority of 

 Americans and Europeans, as well as inhabitants of some other lands, 

 wear boots or shoes made of leather, which also provides the indis- 

 pensible material for great belts that transmit power to machinery in 

 our factories, the best material for gloves, saddles, harness, suitcases, 

 some sorts of upholstery and very numerous other articles. For many 

 purposes no satisfactory substitute is known. So important is this 

 widely-used material that one may be excused for speculating on how 

 different the course of development of modern civilization, or how it 

 might have been retarded, had there been no mammals to provide 

 leather for boots and shoes, to say nothing of the many other articles 

 so very convenient and useful as to be considered essential. 



The following statistics concerning the leather, hide and skin (ex- 



M Marshall, Heller and McWhorter, Karakul sheep, Yearbook U. S. Dept. Agric. 

 for 1915, pp. 249-262. Ashbrook, Fur farming for profit, pp. 239-262, 1928. 



OT Laut. T^c fur trade of America, pp. 66-77, 1921. 



"Green, Chinchilla rabbits for food and fur, U. S. Biol. Surv. Leaflet No. 22, 

 1928. 



