Page:The history of silk, cotton, linen, wool, and other fibrous substances 2.djvu/348

 "An upper garment of this cloth was worn by the Emperor Nicephorus II. at his coronation in the year 936."—Beckmann, l. c. § 31.

"This method of manufacturing beavers'-hair," observes Beckmann, "seems not to have been known in the time of Pliny; for, though he speaks much of the castor, and mentions pellis fibrina three times, he says nothing in regard to manufacturing the hair, or to beaver-fur."

It seems probable, that the Greeks and Romans did not use cloth of beavers'-wool until the 4th century. In an earlier age the furs and drugs supplied by beavers were obtained from the countries to the North of the Euxine Sea. But in the period now under consideration the intercourse of the Romans with the West of Europe would open a much more extended sphere for procuring the Vestes Fibrinæ, since we have traces of the existence of beavers in almost all parts of Europe. Their appearance in Wales, Scotland, Germany, and the North of Europe generally, is attested by Giraldus Cambrensis.

Dr. Patrick Neill, in a valuable paper on this subject, has given an account of the bones of recent beavers found in Perthshire and Berwickshire. They have also been found in Cambridgeshire. We learn from the life of Wulstan, that beaver-furs, as well as those of sables, foxes, and other quadrupeds, were used by the Anglo-Saxons in very early times for lining their garments. Other modern authors speak of their occurrence in Austria, Hungary, and the North of Italy. They are still found in Sweden. Strabo informs us, that in his time they frequented the rivers of Spain.

Buffon says (Hist. Nat. tome 26. p. 98.), "There are beavers in Languedoc in the islands of the Rhone, and great num-*