278 SHEEP. 
source of the riches of England. We know 
not indeed whether the simple Britons and the 
rode Saxons were acquainted with the important 
uses of wool ; it is most probable that they were 
not. But Henry II. paid so much attention to 
the manufacture and improvement of this com- 
modity^ as to forbid the use of any other but 
English wool in the making of cloth. Yet, the 
excellence of English wool was long known be- 
fore the English paid much attention to the art 
of making woollen cloth, or attained any supe- 
rior skill in it. Wool was then a staple article 
for exportation ; and the Flemings were their mer- 
chants. But in the reign of queen Elizabeth, 
several favourable circumstances, which the ta- 
lents and the patriotic spirit of that princess en- 
abled her to take advantage of, concurred to es- 
tablish the woollen manufactory in England, in 
that thriving state in which it has since continued. 
In Scotland we have never attained great excellence 
in this manufacture. Yet, the bonnets, which, 
though now very much out of use, were in for- 
mer times very generally used as a covering for the 
head, and the stockings of such superior fine- 
ness, for which the isles of Shetland and the city 
of Aberdeen are still celebrated, are articles which 
shew that the inhabitants of Scotland are not less 
capable of ingenuity in this way, than their neigh- 
bours of England. The Spanish wool has been 
much celebrated ; and it is not very long since 
broad cloth bearing the name of Spanish, was 
prized above the English. But the wool produ- 
ced in Britain bas been, by f various arts, so much 
improved, as to be now not inferior in excellence 
to that of Spain ; and no woollen cloth is at pre- 
sent esteemed superior to that of English manu- 
facture. The sheep with the finest fleeces in Eng- 
land are fed on the Coteswold downs, and in 
