47 



DRESSING, DYEING AND IMPROVING. 



At one time the Red Indian Avas undoubtedly the best 

 dresser of the skins of the Buffalo and other American 

 animals, and the present art of tanning was largely bor- 

 rowed from the savages. The skins are first placed in an 

 alkali bath, and when the pelt has become soft they are 

 taken out and tubbed; after this they are shaved by 

 passing them over a knife placed in an upright position. 

 Next they are buttered and put into a tub of sawdust, where 

 they are tread by half-naked men until the leather has 

 become soft and supple from the heat of the bodies of the 

 Avorkmen. The skins are then taken out and cleaned and 

 finished. Generally speaking American skin dressers are 

 the best in the world, but in the dressing of squirrel skins 

 the dressers of Weissenfels, in Saxony, surpass all others. 

 This success is probably largely due to the nature of 

 clay and salt deposits available near the town, but how- 

 ever this may be, nearly the whole community of Weissen- 

 fels thrives upon this one industry, in w^hich hundreds of 

 men are employed to dress the skins, which are afterwards 

 sorted, matched, and sewed by thousands of women and 

 children into lining plates, that are acknowledged the world 

 over as being vastlj^ superior to the products of their chief 

 competitors in this branch — the Russians. 



P. L. Simmonds, writing on this subject, says: 

 "The ancients detached the flesh from the skins with 

 sharpened stones and dried them in the sun; after which 

 they were energetically rubbed with oil and grease 

 extracted from the intestines of the slaughtered animals, 

 and a polish was added to the skins by rubbing them with 

 porous stones. The hides of bullocks, horses and other 

 large animals w^ere used to make the tents which sheltered 

 the early Patriarchs, and the skins of the leopards, tigers 

 and smaller animals supplied the wearing apparel with 

 which they were able to glorify themselves before their fel- 

 lowmen. 



At a later period the adhering particles of flesh remain- 

 ing on the skin w'hen it was wrenched from the animal 

 were removed with bone, stone and iron instruments, and 



