450 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1887. 



Cowe, their flesh being very good foode, their hides good lether, their 

 fleeces very usefull, being a kind of wolle, as fine as the wolle of the 

 Beaver, and the Salvages doe make garments thereof." 



Professor Allen quotes a number of authorities who have recorded 

 statements in regard to the manufacture of belts, garters, scarfs, sacks, 

 etc., from buffalo wool by various tribes of Indians.* He also calls at- 

 tention to the only determined efforts ever made by white men on a lib- 

 eral scale for the utilization of buffalo " wool" and its manufacture into 

 cloth, an account of which appears in Boss's "Bed Kiver Settlement," 

 pp. 69-72. In 1821 some of the more enterprising of the Bed Bivei 

 (British) colonists conceived the idea of making fortunes out of the 

 manufacture of woolen goods from the fleece of the buffalo, and for that 

 purpose organized the Buffalo Wool Company, the principal object of 

 which was declared to be " to provide a substitute for wool, which sub- 

 stitute was to be the wool of t,he wild buffalo, which was to be collected 

 in the plains and manufactured both for the use of the colonists and 

 for export." A large number of skilled workmen of various kinds were 

 procured from England, and also a plant of machinery and materials. 

 When too late, it was found that the supply of buffalo wool obtainable 

 was utterly insufficient, the raw wool costing the company Is. 6d. per 

 pound, and cloth which it cost the company £2 10s. per yard to produce 

 was worth only 4s. 6d. per yard in England. The historian states that 

 universal drunkenness on the part of all concerned aided very mate- 

 rially in bringing about the total failure of the enterprise in a very short 

 time. 



While it is possible to manufacture the fine, woolly fur of the bison 

 into cloth or knitted garments, provided a sufficient supply of the raw 

 material could be obtained (which is and always has been impossible), 

 nothing could be more visionary than an attempt to thus produce sal- 

 able garments at a profit. 



Articles of wearing apparel made of buffalo's hair are interesting as 

 curiosities, for their rarity makes them so, but that is the only end 

 they can ever serve so long as there is a sheep living. 



In the National Museum, in the section of animal products, there is 

 displayed a pair of stockings made in Canada from the finest buffalo 

 wool, from the body of the animal. They are thick, heavy, and full of 

 the coarse, straight hairs, which it seems can never be entirely sepa- 

 rated from the fine wool. In general texture they are as coarse as the 

 coarsest sheep's wool would produce. 



With the above are also displayed a rope-like lariat, made by the 

 Comanche Indians, and a smaller braided lasso, seemingly a sample 

 more than a full-grown lariat, made by the Otoe Indians of Nebraska. 

 Both of the above are made of the long, dark-brown hair of the head 

 and shoulders, and in spite of the fact that they have been twisted as 



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