Page:The history of silk, cotton, linen, wool, and other fibrous substances 2.djvu/257

 animals has, from the earliest dawn of human history, formed a striking feature in the condition of man. Of the materials employed by the ancients for making cloth, by far the most important was the wool of sheep. We are able to trace with great probability the process of sheep-breeding and of the use of wool for weaving. Among the bones of quadrupeds, found in ancient caves throughout Europe, we cannot find on consulting the works of Cuvier, Buckland, and De la Beche, that remains of sheep have ever been discovered. This fact affords some reason for presuming, that the sheep is not a native of Europe, but has been introduced there by man.

It appears to have been a general opinion among Zoologists, that the Argali, or Ovis Ammon of Linnæus, which inhabits in vast numbers the elevated regions of Central Asia, is the primitive stock of the whole race of domesticated sheep. Agreeably to this supposition we find, that from the earliest times the inhabitants of Tartary, Persia, Mesopotamia, Syria, Palestine, and the North of Arabia, have been addicted to pastoral employments. The tribes of wandering shepherds, which frequent those countries, are descended from progenitors, who led the same life thousands of years ago, and whose manners and habits are preserved to the present day with scarcely the slightest change.

As might be expected, we have little precise information respecting the Scythians, who inhabited the elevated plains of inner Asia. Some of their hordes are distinguished by Herodotus, Strabo, and others, under the name of Nomadic or pastoral Scythians; and that this denomination was understood to imply, that they tended sheep as well as larger cattle may be inferred from what Herodotus says of their use of felt (See Appendix B.). Strabo, moreover, says of a particular tribe of the Massagetæ, that they had "few sheep," which implies that the rest were rich in flocks; and of another tribe he says, "They do not till the ground, but derive their sustenance from sheep and fish, after the manner of the Nomadic Scythians ." But a much more distinct account of the manners of this people