SHAMOIS

SHAMOIS, CHAMOIS, or SHAMMY, a kind of leather,
either dressed in oil or tanned, much esteemed for
its softness, pliancy, &c. It is prepared from the skin
of the chamois, or shamois, a kind of rupicapra, or wild
goat, called also isard, inhabiting the mountains of Dau-
phin, Savoy, Piedmont, and the Pyrenees. Besides the
softness and warmth of the leather, it has the faculty of
bearing soap without damage; which renders it very use-
ful on many accounts.

In France, &c. some wear the skin raw, without any
preparation. Shammy leather is used for the purifying of
mercury, which is done by passing it through the pores of
this skin, which are very close. The true chamois leather
is counterfeited with common goat, kid, and even
with sheep skins, the practice of which makes a particu-
lar profession, called by the French chamoisier. The
last, though the least esteemed, is yet so popular, and
such vast quantities of it are prepared, especially about
Orleans, Marseilles, and Toulouse, that it may be proper
to give the method of preparation.

Manner of shamoying, or of preparing sheep, goat, or
kid skins in oil, in imitation of shammy.—The skins, being
washed, drained, and smeared over with quicklime on the
fleshy side, are folded in two lengthwise, the wool out-
wards, and laid in heaps, and so left to ferment eight
days, or, if they had been left to dry after slaying, then
fifteen days.

Then they are washed out, drained, and half dried;
laid on a wooden leg, or horse, the wool stripped off with
a round flaff for that purpose, and laid in a weak pit, the
lime whereof had been used before, and has lost the great-
est part of its force.

After 24 hours they are taken out, and left to drain
24 more; they are then put in another stronger pit.
This done, they are taken out, drained, and put in
again, by turns; which begins to dispose them to take
oil; and this practice they continue for six weeks in
summer, or three months in winter: at the end where-
of they are washed out, laid on the wooden leg, and the
surface of the skin on the wool side peeled off, to render
them the softer; then made into parcels, steeped a night
in the river, in winter more, stretched six or seven over
one another on the wooden leg, and the knife passed
strongly on the fleshy side, to take off any thing super-
fluous, and render the skin smooth. Then they are
steeped, as before, in the river, and the same operation
is repeated on the wool side; they are then thrown into
a tub of water, with bran in it, which is brewed among
the skins till the greatest part sticks to them, and then
separated into distinct tubs, till they swell, and rise of
themselves above the water. By this means the re-
mains of the lime are cleared out; they are then wrung
out, hung up to dry on ropes, and sent to the mill, with
the quantity of oil necessary to scour them: the best oil
is that of stock-fish. Here they are first thrown in
bundles into the river for 12 hours, then laid in the
mill-trough, and filled without oil till they be well soft-

ened; then oiled with the hand, one by one, and thus
formed into parcels of four skins each; which are mill-
ed and dried on cords a second time; then a third; and
then oiled again, and dried. This process is repeated
as often as necessity requires; when done, if there be
any moisture remaining, they are dried in a stove, and
made up into parcels wrapped up in wool; after some
time they are opened to the air, but wrapped up again
as before, till such time as the oil seems to have lost all
its force, which it ordinarily does in 24 hours. The
skins are then returned from the mill to the chamoisier
to be scoured; which is done by putting them in a lixi-
vium of wood-ashes, working and beating them in it with
poles, and leaving them to steep till the ley hath had
its effect; then they are wrung out, steeped in another
lixivium, wrung again; and this is repeated till all the
grease and oil be purged out. When this is done, they
are half dried, and passed over a sharp-edged iron instru-
ment, placed perpendicular in a block, which opens,
softens, and makes them gentle. Lastly, they are thor-
oughly dried, and passed over the same instrument
again; which finishes the preparation, and leaves them
in form of shammy.

Kid and goat skins are shamoyed in the same manner
as those of sheep, excepting that the hair is taken off
without the use of any lime; and that when brought
from the mill they undergo a particular preparation
called ramaling, the most delicate and difficult of all the
others. It consists in this, that, as soon as brought from
the mill, they are steeped in a fit lixivium, taken out,
stretched on a round wooden leg, and the hair is scraped
off with the knife; this makes them smooth, and in
working to cast a kind of fine knap. The difficulty is
in scraping them evenly.