Page:Younghusband - Kashmir.pdf/247

 SHAWLS 183

middle of the last century used to be very fashion- able in Europe, but the Franco-Prussian War seems to have sealed the fate of the industry. After 1870 the fashion went out and has never revived ; and the famine of 1877-79 carried off numbers of the weavers, so that now very few carry on the industry. According to M. Dauvergne, who was for many years connected with the shawl and carpet industry in Kashmir, the Kashmir shawl dates back to the times of the Emperor Baber. The first shawls which reached Europe were _prought by Napoleon at the time of his campaign in Egypt as a present to the Empress Josephine. The best shawls are made from the very fine wool, known as pashm, underlying the long hair ‘of the Tibetan goat, which is woven into a delicate material called pashmina on which the shawt patterns are worked. Some of this pashm, and some of the best, is also imported from Chinese Turkestan from the neighbourhood of Ush Turfan. From 1862 to 1870 the export of shawls averaged 25 to 28 lakhs of rupees per annum, or over a quarter of a million sterling, and when the trade was at its zenith 25,000 to 28,000 persons were engaged in their manufacture. Some of the best of the old shawls are preserved