Few kinds of animals furnish a pelt of suitable weight and pliability, and all of them differ widely in elegance of texture, delicacy of shade, and fineness of over-hair; and these differences determine their place in the catalogue of mer chandise. These few animals are not very pro lific, and many of them attain their greatest beauty in wild and uncultivated regions, although there are some notable exceptions. Being thus few in kind, and limited in quantity, the extinc tion of the several choice varieties has been threatened through the persistent energy of trappers.
The principal North American fur-bearing ani mals are beaver, muskrat, hare, and squirrel; the mink, sable, fisher, ermine, weasel, raccoon, badger, and skunk; the lynx, northern and south ern; bears of several kinds; foxes of three or four varieties; two wolves; and most valuable of all, musk-ox, seal, and sea-otter. Of foreign fur bearing animals the most highly prized are the chinchilla, coypu (nutria), and various monkeys, marsupials (opossum, kangaroo, etc.), and cats. (See articles under their names; also, FUR-BEAR ING ANIMALS.) Many of the animals, however, enumerated in the American list are also natives of Northern Europe, whence their pelts come to market under other names.
For manufacturing purposes, furs are classified into felted and dressed. Felted furs, such as beaver, nutria, hare, and rabbit, are used for hats and other felted fabrics, in which the hairs or filaments are made so to interlace or entangle as to form a very strong and close plexus. The quality of the fur is 'better when the skin is taken from the animal in winter than in any other season, giving rise to the distinction be tween `seasoned' and `unseasoned' skins. The removal of the fur from the pelt is a necessary preliminary to the preparation of fur for felting purposes. The long hairs are cut off by a kind of shears; and the true fur is then removed by the action of a knife, requiring much care in its management. In some sorts of skin the long hairs are removed by pulling instead of shearing; in others, the greasiness of the pelt renders neces sary a cleansing process, with the aid of soap and boiling water, before the shearing can be con ducted; and in others, both pelt and fur are so full of grease as to require many repetitions of cleansing. For beaver-skins a machine of special
construction is employed in cutting the fur from the pelt.
Furs have their felting property sometimes increased by the process of earroting, in which the action of heat is combined with that of sul phuric acid. The chief employment of felted furs is described under HAT MANUFACTURE. See also FELT.
Dressed furs are those to which the art of the furrier is applied for making muffs, boas, and fur trimmings for garments. The fur is not sepa rated from the pelt for these purposes; the two are used together; and the pelt is converted into a kind of leather to fit it for being so em ployed.
The process of dressing furs, while in its general outlines the same, differs in its details with the character of the fur. The fur of the seal is prepared as follows: The salt used in pack ing is first thoroughly washed out, and every particle of flesh is carefully removed from the inside of the hide, after which the skins are stretched on frames and slowly dried. The process of thorough washing, this time in soap suds, is repeated, and while the skin is still moist the long over-hair is removed with a knife,. leaving only the short soft fur. This process is a delicate and tedious one. The skin side of the pelts, after being subjected to moist heat, is shaved down until a smooth, even surface is obtained. When the skin is again dry it is placed in a tub filled with fine hardwood saw dust, which absorbs any moisture remaining, and is softened and rendered flexible by treading with the bare feet. It is now ready to be dyed. The coloring matter is applied with a brush to the tips of the fur and distributed by shaking the fur. It is then dried and brushed. The process of dyeing, drying, and brushing is often repeated as many as twelve times.