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MORAL improvers have calls to
preach. I have a friend who has a call to plough, and woe to the daisy sod
or azalea thicket that falls under the savage redemption of his keen steel
shares. Not content with the so-called subjugation of every terrestrial bog,
rock, and moorland, he would fain discover some method of reclamation
applicable to the ocean and the sky, that in due calendar time they might be
brought to bud and blossom as the rose. Our efforts are of no avail when we
seek to turn his attention to wild roses, or to the fact that both ocean and
sky are already about as rosy as possible-the one with stars, the other with
dulse, and foam, and wild light. The practical developments of his culture
are orchards and clover-fields wearing a smiling, benevolent aspect, truly
excellent in their way, though a near view discloses something barbarous in
them all. Wildness charms not my friend, charm it never so wisely: and
whatsoever may be the character of his heaven, his earth seems only a chaos
of agricultural possibilities calling for grubbing-hoes and manures.
Sometimes I venture to approach him with a plea
for wildness, when he good-naturedly shakes a big mellow apple in my face,
reiterating his favorite aphorism, "Culture is an orchard apple; Nature is a
crab." Not all culture, however, is equally destructive and inappreciative.
Azure skies and crystal waters find loving recognition, and few there be who
would welcome the axe among mountain pines, or would care to apply any
correction to the tones and costumes of mountain waterfalls. Nevertheless,
the barbarous notion is almost universally entertained by civilized man,
that there is in all the manufactures of Nature something essentially coarse
which can and must be eradicated by human culture. I was, therefore,
delighted in finding that the wild wool growing upon mountain sheep in the
neighborhood of Mount Shasta was much finer than the average grades of
cultivated wool. This fine discovery was made some three months ago, [This
essay was written early in 1875. [Editor.]] while hunting among the Shasta
sheep between Shasta and Lower Klamath Lake. Three fleeces were obtained -
one that belonged to a large ram about four years old, another to a ewe
about the same age, and another to a yearling lamb. After parting their
beautiful wool on the side and many places along the back, shoulders, and
hips, and examining it closely with my lens, I shouted: "Well done for
wildness! Wild wool is finer than tame!"
My companions stooped down and examined the
fleeces for themselves, pulling out tufts and ringlets, spinning them
between their fingers, and measuring the length of the staple, each in turn
paying tribute to wildness. It was finer, and no mistake; finer than Spanish
Merino. Wild wool is finer than tame.
"Here," said I, "is an argument for fine
wildness that needs no explanation. Not that such arguments are by any means
rare, for all wildness is finer than tameness, but because fine wool is
appreciable by everybody alike - from the most speculative president of
national wool-growers' associations all the way down to the gude-wife
spinning by her ingleside."
Nature is a good mother, and sees well to the
clothing of her many bairns - birds with smoothly imbricated feathers,
beetles with shining jackets, and bears with shaggy furs. In the tropical
south, where the sun warms like a fire, they are allowed to go thinly clad;
but in the snowy northland she takes care to clothe warmly. The squirrel has
socks and mittens, and a tail broad enough for a blanket; the grouse is
densely feathered down to the ends of his toes; and the wild sheep, besides
his undergarment of fine wool, has a thick overcoat of hair that sheds off
both the snow and the rain. Other provisions and adaptations in the dresses
of animals, relating less to climate than to the more mechanical
circumstances of life, are made with the same consummate skill that
characterizes all the love-work of Nature. Land, water, and air, jagged
rocks, muddy ground, sand-beds, forests, underbrush, grassy plains, etc.,
are considered in all their possible combinations while the clothing of her
beautiful wildlings is preparing. No matter what the circumstances of their
lives may be, she never allows them to go dirty or ragged. The mole, living
always in the dark and in the dirt, is yet as clean as the otter or the
wave-washed seal; and our wild sheep, wading in snow, roaming through
bushes, and leaping among jagged storm-beaten cliffs, wears a dress so
exquisitely adapted to its mountain life that it is always found as
unruffled and stainless as a bird.
On leaving the Shasta hunting-grounds I selected
a few specimen tufts, and brought them away with a view to making more
leisue1y 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. Furthermore, it will
be observed that these wild modifications are entirely distinct from those
which are brought chancingly into existence through the accidents and
caprices of culture; the former being inventions of God for the attainment
of definite ends. Like the modifications of limbs - the fin for swimming,
the wing for flying, the foot for walking - so the fine wool for warmth, the
hair for additional warmth and to protect the wool, and both together for a
fabric to wear well in mountain roughness and wash well in mountain storms.
The effects of human culture upon wild wool are
analogous to those produced upon wild roses. In the one case there is an
abnormal development of petals at the expense of the stamens, in the other
an abnormal development of wool at the expense of the hair. Garden roses
frequently exhibit stamens in which the transmutation to petals may be
observed in various stages of accomplishment, and analogously the fleeces of
tame sheep occasionally contain a few wild hairs that are undergoing
transmutation to wool. Even wild wool presents here and there a fiber that
appears to be in a state of change. In the course of my examinations of the
wild fleeces mentioned above, three fibers were found that were wool at one
end and hair at the other. This, however, does not necessarily imply
imperfection, or any process of change similar to that caused by human
culture. Water-lilies contain parts variously developed into stamens at one
end, petals at the other, as the constant and normal condition. These half
wool, half hair fibers may therefore subserve some fixed requirement
essential to the perfection of the whole, or they may simply be the fine
boundary- lines where an exact balance between the wool and the hair is
attained. I have been
offering samples of mountain wool to my friends, demanding in return that
the fineness of wildness be fairly recognized and confessed, but the returns
are deplorably tame. The first question asked is, "Now truly, wild sheep,
wild sheep, have you any wool?" while they peer curiously down among the
hairs through lenses and spectacles. "Yes, wild sheep, you have wool; but
Mary's lamb had more. In the name of use, how many wild sheep, think you,
would be required to furnish wool sufficient for a pair of socks?" I
endeavor to point out the irrelevancy of the latter question, arguing that
wild wool was not made for man but for sheep, and that, however deficient as
clothing for other animals, it is just the thing for the brave
mountain-dweller that wears it. Plain, however, as all this appears, the
quantity question rises again and again in all its commonplace tameness. For
in my experience it seems well-nigh impossible to obtain a hearing on behalf
of Nature from any other standpoint than that of human use. Domestic flocks
yield more flannel per sheep than the wild, therefore it is claimed that
culture has improved upon wildness; and so it has as far as flannel is
concerned, but all to the contrary as far as a sheep's dress is concerned.
If every wild sheep inhabiting the Sierra were to put on tame wool, probably
only a few would survive the dangers of a single season. With their fine
limbs muffled and buried beneath a tangle of hairless wool, they would
become short- winded, and fall an easy prey to the strong mountain wolves.
In descending precipices they would be thrown out of balance and killed, by
their taggy wool catching upon sharp points of rocks. Disease would also be
brought on by the dirt which always finds a lodgment in tame wool, and by
the draggled and water-soaked condition into which it falls during stormy
weather. No dogma
taught by the present civilization seems to form so insuperable an obstacle
in the way of a right understanding of the relations which culture sustains
to wildness as that which regards the world as made - especially for the
uses of man. Every animal, plant, and crystal controverts it in the plainest
terms. Yet it is taught from century to century as something ever new and
precious, and in the resulting darkness the enormous conceit is allowed to
go unchallenged. I have
never yet happened upon a trace of evidence that seemed to show that any one
animal was ever made for another as much as it was made for itself. Not that
Nature manifests any such thing as selfish isolation. In the making of every
animal the presence of every other animal has been recognized. Indeed, every
atom in creation may be said to be acquainted with and married to every
other, but with universal union there is a division sufficient in degree for
the purposes of the most intense individuality; no matter, therefore, what
may be the note which any creature forms in the song of existence, it is
made first for itself, then more and more remotely for all the world and
worlds. Were it not for
the exercise of individualizing cares on the part of Nature, the universe
would be felted together like a fleece of tame wool. But we are governed
more than we know, and most when we are wildest. Plants, animals, and stars
are all kept in place, bridled along appointed ways, with one another, and
through the midst of one another -killing and being killed, eating and being
eaten, in harmonious proportions and quantities. And it is right that we
should thus reciprocally make use of one another, rob, cook and consume to
the utmost of our healthy abilities and desires. Stars attract one another
as they are able, and harmony results. Wild lambs eat as many wild flowers
as they can find or desire, and men and wolves eat the lambs to just the
same extent. This
consumption of one another in its various modifications is a kind of culture
varying with the degree of directness with which it is carried out, but we
should be careful not to ascribe to such culture any improving qualities
upon those on whom it is brought to bear. The water-ouzel plucks moss from
the river-bank to build its nest, but it does not improve the moss by
plucking it. We pluck feathers from birds, and less directly wool from wild
sheep, for the manufacture of clothing and cradle- nests, without improving
the wool for the sheep, or the feathers for the bird that wore them. When a
hawk pounces upon a linnet and proceeds to pull out its feathers,
preparatory to making a meal, the hawk may be said to be cultivating the
linnet, and he certainly does effect an improvement as far as hawk-food is
concerned; but what of the songster? He ceases to be a linnet as soon as he
is snatched from the woodland choir; and when, hawklike, we snatch the wild
sheep from its native rock, and, instead of eating and wearing it at once,
carry it home, and breed the hair out of its wool and the bones out of its
body, it ceases to be a sheep.
These breeding and plucking processes are
similarly improving as regards the secondary uses aimed at; and, although
the one requires but a few minutes for its accomplishment, the other many
years or centuries, they are essentially alike. We eat wild oysters alive
with great directness, waiting for no cultivation, and leaving scarce a
second of distance between the shell and the lip; but we take wild sheep
home and subject them to the many extended processes of husbandry, and
finish by boiling them in a pot -a process which completes all sheep
improvements as far as man is concerned. It will be seen, therefore, that
wild wool and tame wool - wild sheep and tame sheep - are terms not properly
comparable, nor are they in any correct sense to be considered as bearing
any antagonism toward each other; they are different things, planned and
accomplished for wholly different purposes.
Illustrative examples bearing upon this
interesting subject may be multiplied indefinitely, for they abound
everywhere in the plant and animal kingdoms wherever culture has reached.
Recurring for a moment to apples. The beauty and completeness of a wild
apple tree living its own life in the woods is heartily acknowledged by all
those who have been so happy as to form its acquaintance. The fine wild
piquancy of its fruit is unrivaled, but in the great question of quantity as
human food wild apples are found wanting. Man, therefore, takes the tree
from the woods, manures and prunes and grafts, plans and guesses, adds a
little of this and that, selects and rejects, until apples of every
conceivable size and softness are produced, like nut-galls in response to
the irritating punctures of insects. Orchard apples are to me the most
eloquent words that culture has ever spoken, but they reflect no
imperfection upon Nature's spicy crab. Every cultivated apple is a crab, not
improved, but cooked, variously softened and swelled out in the process,
mellowed, sweetened, spiced, and rendered pulpy and foodful, but as utterly
unfit for the uses of nature as a meadowlark killed and plucked and roasted.
Give to Nature every cultured apple codling, pippin, russet - and every
sheep so laboriously compounded - muffled Southdowns, hairy Cotswolds,
wrinkled Merinos - and she would throw the one to her caterpillars, the
other to her wolves. It
is now some thirty-six hundred years since Jacob kissed his mother and set
out across the plains of Padan-aram to begin his experiments upon the flocks
of his uncle, Laban; and, notwithstanding the high degree of excellence he
attained as a wool-grower, and the innumerable painstaking efforts
subsequently made by individuals and associations in all kinds of pastures
and climates, we still seem to be as far from definite and satisfactory
results as we ever were. In one breed the wool is apt to wither and crinkle
like hay on a sun- beaten hillside. In another, it is lodged and matted
together like the lush tangled grass of a manured meadow. In one the staple
is deficient in length, in another in fineness; while in all there is a
constant tendency toward disease, rendering various washings and dippings
indispensable to prevent its falling out. The problem of the quality and
quantity of the carcass seems to be as doubtful and as far removed from a
satisfactory solution as that of the wool. Desirable breeds blundered upon
by long series of groping experiments are often found to be unstable and
subject to disease - bots, foot-rot, blind-staggers, etc. - causing infinite
trouble, both among breeders and manufacturers. Would it not be well,
therefore, for some one to go back as far as possible and take a fresh
start? The source or
sources whence the various breeds were derived is not positively known, but
there can be hardly any doubt of their being descendants of the four or five
wild species so generally distributed throughout the mountainous portions of
the globe, the marked differences between the wild and domestic species
being readily accounted for by the known variability of the animal, and by
the long series of painstaking selection to which all its characteristics
have been subjected. No other animal seems to yield so submissively to the
manipulations of culture. Jacob controlled the color of his flocks merely by
causing them to stare at objects of the desired hue; and possibly Merinos
may have caught their wrinkles from the perplexed brows of their breeders.
The California species (Ozris montana) [The wild sheep of California are now
classified as Otis nelsoni. Whether those of the Shasta region belonged to
the latter species, or to the bighorn species of Oregon, Idaho, and
Washington, is still an unsettled question. [Editor.]] is a noble animal,
weighing when full-grown some three hundred and fifty pounds, and is well
worthy the attention of wool-growers as a point from which to make a new
departure, for pure wildness is the one great want, both of men and of
sheep. |
