B. Davis, of Columbia, S. C., was recommended, and he received the appointment. The work done by Dr. Davis appeared to be highly gratifying to the Sultan, and so, upon his return, in 1849, the Sultan, desiring to reciprocate the courtesy of the President, presented him with nine of the choicest goats in his dominion. Col. Richard Peters, writing in 1876, says of these animals: "These doubtless were selected from the herds of Angora, a district of country lying among the Taurus Mountains, which traverse Asiatic Turkey, and which derives its name from its principal city, situated about 200 miles east of Constantinople." It does not seem, therefore, that Dr. Davis encountered any great difficulty in securing this first importation of Angora goats into this country; but the following extract from the Country Gentleman of 1856, somewhat romantic and a little exciting, was signed by one Richard Allen, of Tennessee. The article, in full, shows that he was probably of that class of writers of history whose personal interests were to be subserved:

It may not be out of place in this connection to remark that great credit is due to Dr. Davis, of South Carolina, for the enterprise he exhibited in the introduction of the goat to this country. He was at the time in the employ of the Turkish Government, at a salary of $15,000, engaged in experiments upon the growing of cotton in the Sultan's dominions. He went out upon the recommendation of President Polk, to whom an application was made by the Turkish Government for the services of some competent Southern gentleman familiar with cotton culture. While there he determined to procure the goat from its native wilds. The story of the journey would be too tedious for my brief letter, and I will merely add that, with an expensive outfit at Constantinople, a perilous journey of months, and the loss of many men and camels, he succeeded in capturing and carrying off eleven of the famous animals, whose fleeces, in the shape of shawls, are so highly prized and coveted by the ladies of all civilized nations and for which prices almost startling have been paid by the wealthy.

Such a tale of fortitude and determination, added to the information in another paragraph in the same letter which stated that the entire yield of the particular flock about which he was then writing had been engaged in the city of New York at $8.50 per pound, from which point it was to be shipped to Paisley, Scotland, for manufacture into the shawls mentioned above, no doubt assisted in the sale of goats at $1,000 each.

In 1863, Hon. George A. Porter, of Baltimore, himself a breeder of Angoras, wrote to Mr. Diehl that, while occupying the post of United States consul at Constantinople, he "procured and shipped for Dr. Davis the first of these goats that were ever brought to this country." Just how much Mr. Porter was acting upon the courtesy of the Sultan it is difficult to ascertain.

Of the nine Angoras imported by Dr. Davis, seven were does and two were bucks. Besides these, according to Colonel Peters, there came in the same lot one purebred Tibet doe, several head of crosses between the Angora and Tibet goats, and quite a number of grade does bred from the common short-haired ewes of the country and his Angora bucks. Plate I shows a pair of the Angoras imported by Dr.

Davis. The first is a buck, weighing 155 pounds and carrying a fleece of 7 pounds; the second is a doe, weighing 102 pounds, carrying a fleece of 4 pounds. These pictures appeared in the Country Gentleman in 1856 and were furnished that paper by Col. Richard Peters, who was at that time the owner of the goats. Dr. Davis, not being familiar with goats, thought these were the famous Cashmere goats which furnished the fiber for the costly Cashmere shawl, and they were called Cashmere goats for many years after their introduction into the United States. The records show that as late as 1861 Mr. William M. Landrum, the veteran breeder of Angoras, was awarded a silver goblet and $25 in cash for the introduction of the first Cashmeres [Angoras] into California. Hon. Israel S. Diehl, writing on "The Goat" in the Annual Report of this Department for 1863, gives descriptions of different varieties of Angoras in Asia Minor, among which was one variety which might very easily be mistaken for the Cashmere. He says:

There is also a second or other variety of Angora, or shawl, goat besides those generally described. This goat has an unchanging outer cover of long, coarse hair, between the roots of which comes in winter an undercoat of downy wool that is naturally thrown off in spring or is carefully combed out for use. A remarkably fine species of this breed exists throughout the area to which the white-haired goat is limited, and similar breeds prevail all over the highlands of Turkish and Persian Armenia, Koordistan, and at Kirman; and, although some flocks yield finer fleeces than others, it is called the same wool or under down as the wool of Cashmere and Tibet, and samples of the wool of the Tibetan and the double-wooled goat of the banks of the Euxine show them to be but varieties of the same species.

This goat is of a larger size than those of the more southern Turkish provinces and its wool finer, and is the variety probably introduced by Dr. Davis from Asia Minor as the Cashmere, and now erroneously so called throughout the country, as all the importations of this country, as far as we can learn, were shipped from ports on the Mediterranean or Constantinople, several thousand miles from Cashmere or Tibet, through inhospitable and almost untraveled countries for Europeans, which goes far to prove the so-called "Cashmere goat" to be the Angora.

Mr. Diehl, in the same article mentioned above, describes the Cashmere goat. The difference between it and the Angora of our country will be seen to be distinct. The similarity of the variety of Angora described above and the Cashmere is marked, especially in respect of the downy undercoat. His description of the Cashmere is as follows: This variety of the wool-bearing or shawl goat, as it is often called, is spread over Tibet, Northern India, and the regions to the east of the Caspian Sea. It is somewhat smaller than the common and Angora goat. It has straight, round, pointed horns, pendent ears; is covered with straight and falling long, fine, flat, silky hair, with an undercoat in winter of a delicate greenish wool, of but 2 to 3 ounces each, which latter alone constitutes the fabric from which the celebrated shawls are made. Ten goats furnish only enough for a shawl 14 yards square; but this is often found differing both in color and the quality of the wool, or rather the fine hair, of which the fleece is composed. The principal points in the most approved breeds are large ears, the limbs slender and cleanly formed, the horns not spirally twisted, and, above all, the fleece being long, straight, fleecy, and white.

This soft undercoat of the Cashmere is known as "pashum," and is the product from which the famous Cashmere shawl was made. Mr. William M. Landrum, who was probably the first in this country to discover that our so-called Cashmere goat was the Angora instead, through investigations made about 1861, also states that there is a difference between the Cashmere shawl and the Paisley shawl. These are often referred to as being the same shawl. While the filling of both shawls was of pashum, the chain of the latter was made from the kid fleece of the Angora. Pashum is combed out in the spring, and is worth, when cleaned, in the country where it is produced, from $1.50 to $2 per pound. A writer in the Penny Magazine (London) in 1838 says:

The wool is first combed from the animal in the mountains of Tibet, where it is sold for nearly 5 shillings a pound. It is packed in baskets and sent to Cashmere, where it pays a duty on entry. It is there bleached with rice flour, spun into threads, and taken to the bazaar, where another tax is paid upon it. The thread is then dyed, the shawl is woven, and the border sewed on.

So much for the Cashmere goat.

The first (or Davis) importation of Angoras was frequently exhibited at fairs, and always attracted much attention. The reports made by the officials of fair associations were always favorable, sometimes flattering, and as is known, after years of experience, not always correct. The United States Agricultural Society, which held an exhibition in Philadelphia in 1856, awarded to Col. Richard Peters, who was then the owner of the Davis goats, $100 as a special reward. The following report was made upon the animals:

They have become known as Cashmere goats from the pure white color and fineness of their fleeces, and their undoubted Eastern origin. The fleeces from the bucks weigh from 6 to 7 pounds, those from the ewes from 3 to 4 pounds. The flesh of the crosses is superior to most mutton, tender and delicious, making them a desirable acquisition to our food-producing animals.

The ease with which they are kept, living as they do on weeds, briers, browse, and other coarse herbage, fits them for many portions of our country where sheep can not be sustained to advantage, while their ability and disposition to defend themselves against dogs evidence a value peculiar to this race. They are free from all diseases to which sheep are liable, hardy and prolific, and experience has proven that they readily adapt themselves to all portions of the United States. The bucks breed readily with the common goats, the second cross yielding a fleece of practical utility, whilst the fourth is but little inferior to that of the pure breed.

A flock of valuable wool-bearing goats can be raised in a few years by using grade bucks.

The following extract is from a report of the special committee appointed by the American Institute at its exhibition in New York City in 1855:

They have examined with much interest the fleece submitted to them, and as well from their own observations as from the results of a microscopic examination made