On Leaving The Shasta Hunting Grounds I Selected A Few Specimen Tufts,
And Brought Them Away With A View To Making More Leisurely
Examinations; But, Owing To The Imperfectness Of The Instruments At My
Command, The Results Thus Far Obtained Must Be Regarded Only As Rough
Approximations.
As already stated, the clothing of our wild sheep is composed of fine
wool and coarse hair.
The hairs are from about two to four inches
long, mostly of a dull bluish-gray color, though varying somewhat with
the seasons. In general characteristics they are closely related to
the hairs of the deer and antelope, being light, spongy, and elastic,
with a highly polished surface, and though somewhat ridged and
spiraled, like wool, they do not manifest the slightest tendency to
felt or become taggy. A hair two and a half inches long, which is
perhaps near the average length, will stretch about one fourth of an
inch before breaking. The diameter decreases rapidly both at the top
and bottom, but is maintained throughout the greater portion of the
length with a fair degree of regularity. The slender tapering point
in which the hairs terminate is nearly black: but, owing to its
fineness as compared with the main trunk, the quantity of blackness is
not sufficient to affect greatly the general color. The number of
hairs growing upon a square inch is about ten thousand; the number of
wool fibers is about twenty-five thousand, or two and a half times
that of the hairs. The wool fibers are white and glossy, and
beautifully spired into ringlets. The average length of the staple is
about an inch and a half. A fiber of this length, when growing
undisturbed down among the hairs, measures about an inch; hence the
degree of curliness may easily be inferred. I regret exceedingly that
my instruments do not enable me to measure the diameter of the fibers,
in order that their degrees of fineness might be definitely compared
with each other and with the finest of the domestic breeds; but that
the three wild fleeces under consideration are considerably finer than
the average grades of Merino shipped from San Francisco is, I think,
unquestionable.
When the fleece is parted and looked into with a good lens, the skin
appears of a beautiful pale-yellow color, and the delicate wool fibers
are seen growing up among the strong hairs, like grass among stalks of
corn, every individual fiber being protected about as specially and
effectively as if inclosed in a separate husk. Wild wool is too fine
to stand by itself, the fibers being about as frail and invisible as
the floating threads of spiders, while the hairs against which they
lean stand erect like hazel wands; but, notwithstanding their great
dissimilarity in size and appearance, the wool and hair are forms of
the same thing, modified in just that way and to just that degree that
renders them most perfectly subservient to the well-being of the
sheep.
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