448 ON THE COMMERCE AND USES OE THE HAIR OF ANIMALS. 



Cow Hair is in this country chiefly used by plasterers for mixing 

 with mortar to make it adhere to walls. It has lately been made into 

 a kind of waterproof bituminous felt, to line damp walls, to place between 

 partitions, to prevent draft or deaden sound, for roofing, for sheathing 

 ship's bottoms, and for clothing boilers and pipes of steam engines. 



In Sicily it is used for stuffing sofas and chair cushions, the 

 price locally being about 41. per cwt. Carpets of cow hair are common 

 in some parts of Germany, selling at about 10 Prussian dollars each. 

 Cow hair socks are made by the peasantry in the interior of Norway. 

 Cow hair rope is used in paper manufactories, and occasionally for 

 other purposes. The supply of cow hair is principally obtained at 

 home, but about 20,000 cwt. is imported chiefly from Germany and 

 France, worth about 51. the cwt. This is probably cow-tail hair, which 

 is used for stuffing furniture in the same way as short horsehair. Wet 

 cow hair is sold at tanneries for abcut 2s. 6d. the bushel, and is after- 

 wards dried and the lime beaten out. Cow hair is sold here in packs 

 of 240 lbs. 



Goat's Hair or Mohair, is the woolly hair or fleece of the Angora 

 goat, (Capra Angorensis), a native of a small district of Asia Minor. 

 The silky hair of this goat, which hangs in long curls, is invariably 

 white, the average length of the staple being 5 to 6 inches. The fleece 

 is called locally " Tiftik.'' When clipped annually in April or May they 

 yield from H to 4 lbs. of wool or hair according to age. The demand 

 for this wool is only of recent origin. In 1848, mixtures of it, with alpaca, 

 silk, cotton, and worsted, came into use for ladies dresses, and for a heavy 

 material known by the name of flushing, for gentlemen's overcoats ; in 

 which article the goat's wool was thrown to the surface, so as to re- 

 semble, to some extent, the original fleece, except in colour. The prin- 

 cipal consumption of mohair now, is for mixing with other animal fibres 

 for ladies' dresses, light' overcoats, coat-linings, lustres, tabinets and 

 fringes, umbrellas, &c. ; and also for spinning into yarn, which is 

 exported to France and Belgium, chiefly for the manufacture of 

 Utrecht velvet, for the coverings of furniture, linings of carriages, 

 plush, &c ; and to some extent for a cheap imitation of black silk-lace, 

 braid button coverings, and other articles. 



Mohair is perfectly free from " underdown," unlike the Thibet or 

 Cashmere fleece, which has a downy covering on the pelt, with long 

 coarse hair, or kemps at the top, the separation of which is both tedious 

 and expensive. In sorting mohair, about one-sixth part is taken out, 

 which is too short in the staple and not applicable for combing purposes, 

 and in the process of combing, about one-fifth part is made into " noils ;" 

 these, together, are bought by woollen manufacturers, for making into 

 cloth of different kinds and other materials. 



Late accounts state that the animals yielding the fleece have been 

 so multiplied that the product has realised about 1,000,000 okes, nearly 

 3,000,000 lbs. But the price having greatly risen in England from its 



