The Peruvians, though
lining a long extent of sea-coast, had no foreign commerce.
They had peculiar advantages for domestic manufacture in a
material incomparably superior to any thing possessed by the
other races of the Western continent. They found a good
substitute for linen in a fabric which, like the Aztecs, they
knew how to weave from the tough thread of the maguey. Cotton
grew luxuriantly on the low, sultry level of the coast, and
furnished them with a clothing suitable to the milder latitudes
of the country. But from the llama and the kindred species of
Peruvian sheep they obtained a fleece adapted to the colder
climate of the table-land, "more estimable," to quote the
language of a well-informed writer, "than the down of the
Canadian beaver, the fleece of the brebis des Calmoucks, or of
the Syrian goat." *1
[Footnote 1: Walton, Historical and Descriptive Account of the
Peruvian Sheep, (London, 1811,) p. 115. This writer's comparison
is directed to the wool of the vicuna, the most esteemed of the
genus for its fleece.]
Of the four varieties of the Peruvian sheep, the llama, the one
most familiarly known, is the least valuable on account of its
wool. It is chiefly employed as a beast of burden, for which,
although it is somewhat larger than any of the other varieties,
its diminutive size and strength would seem to disqualify it. It
carries a load of little more than a hundred pounds, and cannot
travel above three or four leagues in a day.
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