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44 human wear are the spoils of those other creatures. From the earliest times man has robbed the beasts of their skins in order to increase the protective power of his own less efficient heat-retaining cuticle. The book of Genesis gives great importance to this ancient custom, and speaks of the Deity as Himself making garments out of skins for Adam and Eve to wear. Thus, in Semitic belief; as, in point of fact, the study of savage life teaches us, the first clothes were skins, and through all the thousands of years which have elapsed since primitive man first clothed himself in finery borrowed from his slaughtered prey to the present day, fur has been a favourite garb of shivering mortality.

The invention of weaving, however, the origin of which dates so far back that it is shrouded in a mist of ages which history has not lifted, brought woollen materials and those made of vegetable fibre into rivalry with the more easily obtained fur. This was a great advance. To produce woven garments no animals had to be slaughtered, while woollen made serviceable ordinary wear, being a good non-conductor, more adaptable than skins, and capable of being washed. Clothes made of vegetable fibres were found pleasant in hot weather, as, being good conductors, they allowed the heat of the body to pass away from it, thus giving a sensation of coolness.

Besides their adorning functions, clothes have two purposes—to keep the body warm and to cover it. Primitive men and women in cold weather wore their skin garments; but in warm weather, dis-