Silks had various names

[90]Ancient Egyptians, iii. 130.

[91]Church of our Fathers, i. 469.

[92]Mon. Anglic. t. i. p. 382.

[93]Hist. Elien. lib. ii., c. 139, p. 283, ed. Steuart.

Equally interesting to our present subject is the process of twining long narrow strips of gold, or in its stead gilt silver, round a line of silk or flax, and thus producing

Probably its origin, as far as flax and not silk is concerned, as being the underlying substance, is much earlier than has been supposed; and when Attalus’s name was bestowed upon a new method of interweaving gold with wool or linen, it happened so not because that Pargamanean kinghad been the first to think of twisting gold about a far less costly material, and thus, in fact, making gold thread such as we now have, but through his having suggested to the weaver the long-known golden thread as a woof into the textiles from his loom. From this point of view, we may easily believe what Pliny says: “Aurum intexere in eadem Asia invenit Attalus rex; unde nomen Attalicis.”[94]In that same Asia King Attalus invented the method of using a woof of gold; from this circumstance the Attalic cloths got their name.

That, at least for working embroidery, ladies at an early Christian period used to spin their own gold thread, would seem from a passage in Claudian. Writing on the elevation to the consulate of the two brothers Probinus and Olybrius, at the end of the fourth century, the poet thus gracefully compliments their aged mother, Proba, who with her own hands had worked the purple and gold-embroidered robes, the “togæ pictæ,” or “trabeæ,” to be worn by her sons in their office:

Lætatur veneranda parens, et pollice doctoJam parat auratas trabeas ...Et longum tenues tractus producit in aurumFilaque concreto cogit squalere metallo.[95]

Lætatur veneranda parens, et pollice doctoJam parat auratas trabeas ...

Lætatur veneranda parens, et pollice docto

Jam parat auratas trabeas ...

Et longum tenues tractus producit in aurumFilaque concreto cogit squalere metallo.[95]

Et longum tenues tractus producit in aurum

Filaque concreto cogit squalere metallo.[95]

The joyful mother plies her learned hands,And works all o’er the trabea golden bands,Draws the thin strips to all their length of gold,To make the metal meaner threads enfold.

The joyful mother plies her learned hands,

And works all o’er the trabea golden bands,

Draws the thin strips to all their length of gold,

To make the metal meaner threads enfold.

A consular figure, arrayed in the purple trabea, profusely embroidered in gold, is shown in “The Church of our Fathers.”[96]

[94]Lib. viii. c. 47.

[95]In Probini et Olybrii Consulatum, 177-182.

[96]T. ii. p. 131.

That, in the thirteenth century our own ladies, like the Roman Proba, themselves used to make the gold thread needed for their own embroidery is certain; and the process which they followed is set forth as one of the items among the other costs for that magnificent frontal wroughtA.D.1271, for the high altar at Westminster Abbey. As that bill itself, to be seen on the Chancellor’s Roll for the year 56 of Henry III., affords so many curious and available particulars about the whole subject in hand, we will give it here at full length for the sake of coming back hereafter to its several parts: “In xij. ulnis de canabo ad frontale magni altaris ecclesiæ (Westmonasterii) et cera ad eundem pannum ceranda, vs.vid.Et in vj marcis auri ad idem frontale, liij marcas. Et in operacionedicti auri, et sessura (scissura?) et filatura ejusdem, iiijl.xiijs.Et in ij libris serici albi et in duobus serici crocei ad idem opus, xxxvs.Et in perlis albis ponderis v marcarum, et dimidiæ ad idem opus lxxli.Et pro grossis perlis ad borduram ejusdem panni, ponderis ij marcarum, xiijli.dimidiam marcam. Et in una libra serici grossi, xs.Et in stipendio quatuor mulierum operancium in predicto panno per iij annos et iij partes unius anni, xxxvili. Et in Dccciijxxvi estmalles ponderis liiis.ad borduram predictam. Et pro lxxvj asmallis grossis ponderis lxvs.ad idem frontale iiijxxli.xvjs.Et pro Dl gernectis positis in predictis borduris, lxvis.Et in castoniis auri ad dictas gernectas imponendas ponderis xijs.vjd., cxijs.vjd.Et in pictura argenti posita subtus predicta asmalla, ij marcas. Et in vj ulnis cardonis de viridi, iijs.”[97]As the pound-weight now is widely different from the pound sterling, so then the mark-weight of gold cost nine marks of money. The “operacio auri” of the above document consisted in flattening out, by a broad-faced hammer like one such as our gold-beaters still use, the precious metal into a sheet thin as our thinnest paper. The “scissura” was the cutting of it afterwards into long narrow strips, the winding of which about the filaments of the yellow silk mentioned, is indicated by the word “filatura,” and thus was made the gold thread of that costly frontal fraught with seed-pearls and other some, of a much larger size, and garnets, or rather carbuncles, and enamels, and which took four women three years and three-quarters to work. At the back it was lined with green frieze or baize—“cardo de viridi.”

Such was the superior quality of some gold thread that it was known to the mediæval world under the name of the place wherein it had been made. Thus we find a mention at one time of Cyprus gold thread—“vestimentum embrowdatum cum aquilis de auro de Cipre;”[98]later, of Venice gold thread—“for frenge of gold of Venys at vjs.the ounce;”[99]“one cope of unwaterd camlet laid with strokes of Venis gold.”[100]What may have been their difference cannot now be pointed out: perhaps the Cyprian thread was so much esteemed because its somewhat broad shred of flat gold was wound about the hempen twist beneath it so nicely as to have the smooth unbroken look of gold wire; while the article from Venice showed everywhere the twisting of common thread.

[97]Rot. Cancel. 56 Henrici III. Compot. Will. de Glouc.

[98]Mon. Anglic. ii. 7.

[99]Wardrobe Accounts of King Edward IV. p. 117, ed. N. H. Nicolas.

[100]Mon. Anglic. ii. 167.

As now, so of old,

given them, meaning either their kind of texture and dressing, their colour and its several tints, the sort of design or pattern woven on them, the country from which they were brought, or the use for which, on particular occasions, they happened to be especially set apart.

All of these designations are of foreign growth; some sprang up in the seventh and following centuries at Byzantium, and, not to be found in classic writers, remain unknown to modern Greek scholars; some are half Greek, half Latin, jumbled together; other some, borrowed from the east, are so shortened, so badly and variously spelt, that their Arabic or Persian derivation can be hardly recognized at present. Yet, without some slight knowledge of them, we may not understand a great deal belonging to trade, and the manners of the times glanced at by our old writers; much less see the true meaning of many passages in our mediæval English poetry.

Among the terms significative of the kind of web, or mode of getting up some sorts of silk, we have

Holosericum, the whole texture of which, as its Greek-Latin compound means to say, is warp and woof wholly pure silk: in a passage from Lampridius, quoted before,p. xix., we learn that so early as the reign of Alexander Severus, the difference between “vestes holosericæ,” and “subsericæ,” was strongly marked, and from which we learn that

Subsericumimplied that such a texture was not entirely, but in part—likely its woof—of silk.

Although the warp only happened to be of silk, while the woof was of gold, still the tissue was often called “holosericum;” of the vestments which Beda says[101]S. Gregory sent over here to S. Austin, one is mentioned by a mediæval writer as “una casula oloserica purpurei coloris aurea textura”—a chasuble all silk, of a purple colour, woven with gold.[102]Examples of “holosericum” and “subsericum” abound in this collection.

[101]Hist. Ecc. lib. i. c. 29.

[102]Bedæ Hist., ed. Smith, p. 691.

Examitum,xamitum, or, as it is called in our old English documents so often,samit, is a word made up of two Greek ones, εξ, “six,” and μίτοι, “threads,” the number of the strings in the warp of the texture. That stuffs woven so thick must have been of the best, is evident. Hence, to say of any silken tissue that it was “examitum,” or “samit,” meant that it was six-threaded, in consequence costly and splendid. At the end of the thirteenth and beginning of the fourteenth centuries,“examitum,” as the writer still names the silk, was much used for vestments in Evesham abbey, as we gather from the “Chronicon” of that house, published lately for the Master of the Rolls.[103]About the same period, among the best copes, chasubles, and vestments in St. Paul’s, London, many were made of “sametum;” so Master Radulph de Baldock chose to call it in his visitation of that church as its dean,A.D.1295.[104]As we observed just now, these rich silks, which were in all colours, with a warp so stiff, became richer still from having a woof of golden thread, or, as we should now say, being shot with gold. But years before, “examitum” was shortened into “samet;” for among the nine gorgeous chasubles bequeathed to Durham cathedral by its bishop, Hugh Pudsey,A.D.1195, there was the “prima de rubea samete nobiliter braudata cum laminis aureis et bizanciis et multis magnis perlis et lapidibus pretiosis.”[105]About a hundred years afterwards the employment of it, after its richest form, in our royal wardrobes, has been pointed out just now,p. xxviii., &c.

In that valuable inventory, lately published, of the rich vestments belonging to Exeter cathedral,A.D.1277, of its numerous chasubles, dalmatics, tunicles, besides its seventy and more copes, the better part were made of this costly tissue here called “samitta;” for example: “casula, tunica, dalmatica de samitta—par (vestimentorum) de rubea samitta cum avibus duo capita habentibus;” “una capa samitta cum leonibus deauratis.”[106]In a later document,A.D.1327, this precious silk is termed “samicta.”[107]

Our minstrels did not forget to array their knights and ladies in this gay attire. When Sir Lancelot of the Lake brought back Gawain to King Arthur:—

Launcelot and the queen were cleddeIn robes of a rich wede,Of samyte white, with silver shredde:The other knights everichone,In samyte green of heathen land,And their kirtles, ride alone.[108]

Launcelot and the queen were cleddeIn robes of a rich wede,Of samyte white, with silver shredde:

Launcelot and the queen were cledde

In robes of a rich wede,

Of samyte white, with silver shredde:

The other knights everichone,In samyte green of heathen land,And their kirtles, ride alone.[108]

The other knights everichone,

In samyte green of heathen land,

And their kirtles, ride alone.[108]

[103]Pp. 282-88.

[104]Dugdale’s St. Paul’s, new ed. pp. 316, &c.

[105]Wills and Inventories, part i. p. 3, published by the Surtees Society.

[106]Lives of the Bishops of Exeter, and a History of the Cathedral, by Oliver, pp. 297, 298.

[107]Ibid. 313.

[108]Ellis’s Metrical Romances, i. 360.

In his “Romaunt of the Rose,” Chaucer describes the dress ofMirthethus:—

Full yong he was, and merry of thoughtAnd in samette, with birdes wrought,And with gold beaten full fetously,His bodie was clad full richely.[109]

Full yong he was, and merry of thought

And in samette, with birdes wrought,

And with gold beaten full fetously,

His bodie was clad full richely.[109]

Many of the beautifully figured damasks in this collection are what anciently were known as “samits;” and if they really be not “six-thread,” according to the Greek etymology of their name, it is because, that at a very early period the stuffs so called ceased to be woven of such a thickness.

Those strong silks of the present day with the thick thread called “organzine” for the woof, and a slightly thinner thread known by the technical name of “tram” for the warp, may be taken to represent the ancient “examits.”

Just as remarkable for the lightness of its texture, as happened to be “samit” on account of the thick substance of its web, yet quite as much sought after, was another kind of thin glossy silken stuff “wrought in the orient” by Paynim hands, and here called first by its Persian name which came with it,ciclatoun, that is, bright and shining; but afterwardssicklatoun,siglaton,cyclas. Often a woof of golden thread lent it more glitter still; and it was used equally for ecclesiastical vestments as for secular articles of stately dress. In the “Inventory of St. Paul’s Cathedral, London,”A.D.1295, there was a cope made of cloth of gold, called “ciclatoun:”—“capa de panno aureo qui vocatur ciclatoun.”[110]

Among the booty carried off by the English when they sacked the camp of Saladin, in the Holy Land,

King Richard took the pavillounsOf sendal, and of cyclatoun.They were shape of castels;Of gold and silver the pencels.[111]

King Richard took the pavillouns

Of sendal, and of cyclatoun.

They were shape of castels;

Of gold and silver the pencels.[111]

In his “Rime of Sire Thopas,” Chaucer says of the doughty swain,

Of Brugges were his hosen brounHis robe was of ciclatoun.[112]

Of Brugges were his hosen broun

His robe was of ciclatoun.[112]

Though so light and thin, this cloak of “ciclatoun” was often embroidered in silk, and had sewn on it golden ornaments; for we read of a young maid who sat,

In a robe ryght ryall bowneOf a red syclatowneBe hur fader syde;A coronell on hur hedd set,Hur clothys with bestes and byrdes wer beteAll abowte for pryde.[113]

In a robe ryght ryall bowne

Of a red syclatowne

Be hur fader syde;

A coronell on hur hedd set,

Hur clothys with bestes and byrdes wer bete

All abowte for pryde.[113]

[109]Poems, ed. Nicolas, t. iv. p. 26.

[110]Dugdale’s St. Paul’s, new ed. p. 318.

[111]Ellis’s Metrical Romances, t. ii. p. 253.

[112]Poems, ed. Nicolas, t. iii. p. 83.

[113]Ancient English Met. Rom., ed. Ritson, t. iii. pp. 8, 9.

When in the field, over their armour, whether of mail or plate, knights wore a long sleeveless gown slit up almost to the waist on both sides: sometimes of “samit,” often of “cendal,” oftener still of “ciclatourn,” because of its flowing showy texture was this garment made, and from a new and contracted way of calling it, the name of the gown, like the shortened one for its stuff, became known as “cyclas,” nothing akin to the κυκλας—the full round article of dress worn by the women of Greece and Rome. When,A.D.1306, before setting out to Scotland, Edward I. girded his son, the prince of Wales, with so much pomp, a knight, in Westminster Abbey; to the three hundred sons of the nobility whom the heir to the throne was afterward to dub knights in the same church, the king made a most splendid gift of attire fitting for the ceremony, and among other textiles sent them were these “clycases” wove of gold:—“Purpura, bissus, syndones, cyclades auro textæ,” &c. as we learn from Matthew Westminster, “Flores Historiarum,” p. 454. How very light and thin must have been all such garments, we gather from the quiet wit of John of Salisbury while jeering the man who affected to perspire in the depth of winter, though clad in nothing but his fine “cyclas:”—“dum omnia gelu constricta rigent, tenui sudat in cylade.”[114]

Not so costly, and even somewhat thinner in texture, was a silken stuff known ascendal,cendallus,sandal,sandalin,cendatus,syndon,syndonus, as the way of writing the word altered as time went on. When Sir Guy of Warwick was knighted,

And with him twenty good gomesKnightes’ and barons’ sons,Of cloth of Tars and rich cendaleWas the dobbing in each deal.[115]

And with him twenty good gomes

Knightes’ and barons’ sons,

Of cloth of Tars and rich cendale

Was the dobbing in each deal.[115]

[114]Polycraticus, lib.VIII.c. xii.

[115]Ellis’s Met. Rom. i. 15.

The Roll of Caerlaverock tells us that among the grand array which met and joined Edward I. at Carlisle,A.D.1300, on his road to invade Scotland, there was to be seen many a rich caparison embroidered upon cendal and samit:—

La ot meint riche guarnementBrodé sur sendaus e samis.[116]

La ot meint riche guarnement

Brodé sur sendaus e samis.[116]

And Lacy, Earl of Lincoln, leading the first squadron, hoisted his banner made of yellow cendal blazoned with a lion rampant purpre.[117]

Baner out de un cendal safrin,O un lioun rampant purprin.

Baner out de un cendal safrin,

O un lioun rampant purprin.

Most, if not all the other flags were made of the same cendal silk.

[116]Roll of Caerlaverock, ed. Wright, p. 1.

[117]Ibid. p. 2.

When the stalworth knight of Southampton wished to keep himself unknown at a tournament, we thus read of him—

Sir Bevis disguised all his weedOf black cendal and of rede,Flourished with roses of silver bright, &c.[118]

Sir Bevis disguised all his weed

Of black cendal and of rede,

Flourished with roses of silver bright, &c.[118]

Of the ten beautiful silken albs which Hugh Pudsey left to Durham, two were made of samit, other two of cendal, or as the bishop calls it,sandal: “Quæ dicuntur sandales.”[119]Exeter cathedral had a red cope with a green lining of sandal: “Capa rubea cum linura viridi sandalis;”[120]and a cape of sandaline: “Una capa de sandalin.”[121]Chasubles, too, were, it is likely, for poorer churches, made of cendal or sandel; Piers Ploughman speaks thus to the high dames of his day—

And ye lovely ladiesWith youre long fyngres,That ye have silk and sandalTo sowe, whan tyme is.Chesibles for chapeleyns,Chirches to honoure, &c.[122]

And ye lovely ladies

With youre long fyngres,

That ye have silk and sandal

To sowe, whan tyme is.

Chesibles for chapeleyns,

Chirches to honoure, &c.[122]

A stronger kind of cendal was wrought and called, in the Latin inventories of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, cendatus afforciatus, and of such there was a cope at St. Paul’s;[123]while another cope of cloth of gold was lined with it,[124]as also a chasuble of red samit given by Bishop Henry of Sandwich.

[118]Ellis’s Met. Rom. ii. 156.

[119]Wills and Inventories, p. 3.

[120]Oliver, p. 299.

[121]Ib. p. 315.

[122]The Vision, Passus Sextus, t. i. p. 117, ed. Wright.

[123]P. 317.

[124]P. 318.

SyndonusorSindonis, as it would seem, was a bettermost sort of cendal. St. Paul’s had a chasuble as well as a cope of this fabric: “Casula de sindone purpurea, linita cendata viridi;[125]“capa de syndono Hispanico.”[126]

[125]P. 323.

[126]Transcriber’s note: Footnote, originally number 9 on page xli, not in original text.

Taffeta, it is likely, if not a thinner, was a less costly silken stuff than cendal; which word, to this day, is used in the Spanish language, and is defined to be a thin transparent textile of silk or linen: “Tela de seda ó lino muy delgada y trasparente.”

As the Knights’ flags:

Ther gonfanens and ther pensellesWer well wrought off grene sendels;

Ther gonfanens and ther penselles

Wer well wrought off grene sendels;

as their long cyclases which they wore over their armour were of cendal, so too were of cendal, all blazoned with their armorial bearings, the housing of the steeds they strode. Of cendal, also, was the lining of the church’s vestments, and the peaceful citizen’s daily garments. Of his “Doctour of Phisike,” Chaucer tells us:—

In sanguin and in perse he clad was alleLined with taffata, and with sendalle.[127]

In sanguin and in perse he clad was alle

Lined with taffata, and with sendalle.[127]

For the weaving of cendal, among the Europeans, Sicily was once celebrated, and a good example from others in this collection, isNo. 8255, p. 163.

[127]Prologue, Poems, ed. Nicolas, ii. 14.

Sarcenet, during the fifteenth century took by degrees the place of cendal, at least here in England.

By some improvement in their weaving of cendal, the Saracens, it is likely in the south of Spain, earned for this light web as they made it, or sold it, a good name in our markets, and it became much sought for here. Among other places, York Cathedral had several sets of curtains for its high altar, “de sarcynet.”[128]At first we distinguished this stuff by calling it, from its makers, “saracenicum.” But while Anglicising, we shortened that appellation into the diminutive “sarcenet;” and this word we keep to the present day, for the thin silk which of old was known among us as “cendal.”

[128]Fabric Rolls, &c. p. 227.

Satin, though far from being so common as other silken textures, was not unknown to England, in the middle ages; and of it thus speaks Chaucer, in his “Man of Lawes Tale:”

In Surrie whilom dwelt a compagnieOf chapmen rich, and therto sad and trewe,That wide were senten hir spicerie,Clothes of gold, and satins riche of hewe.[129]

In Surrie whilom dwelt a compagnie

Of chapmen rich, and therto sad and trewe,

That wide were senten hir spicerie,

Clothes of gold, and satins riche of hewe.[129]

[129]Poems, ii. 137.

But as Syria herself never grew the more precious kinds of spices, so we do not believe that she was the first to hit upon the happy mechanical expedient of getting up a silken texture so as to take, by the united action at the same moment of strong heat and heavy pressure upon its face, that lustrous metallic shine which we have in satin.No. 702, p. 8, is a good example of late Chinese manufacture, a process which this country is only now beginning to understand and successfully employ.

When satin first appeared in trade, it was all about the shores of the Mediterranean called “aceytuni.” This term slipped through early Italian lips into “zetani;” coming westward this, in its turn, dropped its“i,” and smoothed itself into “satin,” a word for this silk among us English as well as our neighbours in France, while in Italy it now goes by the name of “raso,” and the Spaniards keep up its first designation in their dictionary.

In the earlier inventories of church vestments, no mention can be found of satin; and it is only among the various rich bequests (ed. Oliver) made to his cathedral at Exeter by Bishop Grandison, betweenA.D.1327-69 that this fine silk is spoken of; though later, and especially in the royal wardrobe accompts (ed. Nicolas), it is perpetually specified. Hence we may fairly assume that till the beginning of the fourteenth century satin was unknown in England; afterwards it met much favour. Flags were made of it. On board the stately ship in which Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, in the reign of Henry VI., sailed from England to France, there were flying “three penons of satten,” besides “sixteen standards of worsted entailed with a bear and a chain,” and a great streamer of forty yards in length and eight yards in breadth, with a great bear and griffin holding a ragged staff poudred full of ragged staffs.[130]Like other silken textiles, satin seems to have been, in some few instances, interwoven with flat gold thread, so as to make it a tissue: for example, Lincoln had of the gift of one of its bishops, eighteen copes of red tinsel sattin with orphreys of gold.[131]

Though not often, yet sometimes do we read of a silken stuff called,cadas,carda,carduus, and used for inferior purposes. The outside silk on the cocoon is of a poor quality compared with the inner filaments, from which it is kept quite apart in reeling, and set aside for other uses; this iscadaswhich the Promptorium Parvulorum defines, however, as “Bombicinium,” or silk. St. Paul’s,A.D.1295, had “pannus rubeus diasperatus de Laret lineatus de carda Inda;”[132]and Exeter possessed another cloth for the purpose: “Cum carduis viridibus.”[133]More frequently, instead of being spun it served as wadding in dress; on the barons at the siege of Caerlaverock, might be seen many a rich gambeson garnished with silk, cadas, and cotton:—

Meint riche gamboison guarniDe soi, de cadas e coton.[134]

Meint riche gamboison guarni

De soi, de cadas e coton.[134]

One of the Lenten veils at St. Paul’s, in the chapel of St. Faith, was of blue and yellow carde: “velum quadragesimale de carde croceo et indico.”[135]The quantity of card purchased for the royal wardrobe,in the twenty-eighth year of Edward I.’s reign,A.D.1299, is set forth in the Liber Quotidianus, &c.[136]

Chasubles made in the thirteenth century, and belonging to Hereford Cathedral, were lined with carda: “Unam casulam de rubeo sindone linita de carda crocea—tertiam casulam de serico de India linita de carda viridi,” &c.[137]

[130]Baronage of England, Dugdale, i. 246.

[131]Mon. Anglic. viii. 1282.

[132]P. 335.

[133]Ed. Oliver, p. 317.

[134]Roll. p. 30.

[135]St. Paul’s ed. Dugdale, p. 336.

[136]P. 354.

[137]Roll of the Household Expenses of Swinford, Bishop of Hereford, t. ii. p. xxxvi. ed. Web. for the Camden Society.

Camoca,camoka,camak,camora(a misspelling), as the name is differently written, was a textile of which in England we hear nothing before the latter end of the fourteenth century. No sooner did it make its appearance than this camoca rose into great repute; the Church used it for her liturgical vestments, and royalty employed it for dress on grand occasions as well as in adorning palaces, especially in draping beds of state. In the year 1385, besides some smaller articles, the royal chapel in Windsor Castle had a whole set of vestments and other ornaments for the altar, of white camoca: “Unum vestimentum album de camoca,” &c.... “Album de camoca, cum casula.”[138]... “Duo quissini rubei de camoca.”[139]To his cathedral of Durham, the learned Richard Bury left a beautifully embroidered whole set of vestments,A.D.1345: “Unum vestimentum de alma camica (sic) subtiliter brudata,” &c.[140]

Our princes must have arrayed themselves, on grand occasions, in camoca; for thus Herod, in one of the Coventry Misteries—the Adoration of the Magi—is made to boast of himself: “In kyrtyl of cammaka kynge am I cladde.”[141]But it was in draping its state-beds that our ancient royalty showed its affection for camoca. To his confessor, Edward the Black Prince bequeaths “a large bed of red camora (sic) with our arms embroidered at each corner,”[142]and the prince’s mother leaves to another son of hers, John Holland, “a bed of red camak.”[143]Our nobles, too, had the same likings, for Edward Lord Despencer,A.D.1375, wills to his wife, “my great bed of blue camaka, with griffins, also another bed of camaka, striped with white and black.”[144]What may have been the real texture of this stuff, thought so magnificent, we do not positively know, but hazarding a guess, we think it to have been woven of fine camel’s hair and silk, and of Asiatic workmanship.

From this mixed web pass we now to another, one even more precious, that is theCloth of Tars, which we presume to have, in a manner, beenthe forerunner of the now so celebrated cashmere, and along with silk made of the downy wool of a family of goats reared in several parts of Asia, but especially in Tibet, as we shall try to show a little further on.

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