The use of vegetable tanning materials, though prehistoric, is probably less ancient than the methods I have described, and may possibly have been discovered in early attempts at dyeing; an art which perhaps had its origin even before the use of clothing! The tannins are very widely distributed in the vegetable kingdom, and most barks, and many fruits, are capable of making leather. The employment of alum and salt in tanning was probably of still later introduction, and must have originated in countries where alum is found as a natural product. The art was lost or unknown in Europe till introduced into Spain by the Moors. Leather manufacture reached considerable perfection in ancient Egypt. A granite carving, probably at least 4000 years old, is preserved in the Berlin Museum, in which leather-dressers are represented. One is taking a tiger-skin from a tub or pit, a second is employed at another tub, while a third is working a skin upon a table. Embossed and gilt leather straps have been found on a mummy of the ninth century B.C., and an Egyptian boat-cover of embossed goat leather, as well as shoes of dyed and painted morocco, are still in comparatively good preservation. The art is of very early date in China, and was well understood by the Greeks and Romans. In the Grosvenor Museum at Chester is the sole of a Roman _caliga_, studded with bronze nails, which is yet pretty flexible. After the fall of the Roman empire many arts were lost to Europe, and it was not until the Moorish invasion of Spain that the art of dyeing and finishing the finer kinds of leather was reintroduced. England was very backward in this manufacture up to the end of the last century, owing to the fossilising influence of much paternal legislation, and of certain excise-duties, which were only repealed in 1830. Since this time the art has made rapid strides, especially in the use of labour-saving machinery, and England may at the present moment be considered fairly abreast of any other country as a whole; though in some special manufactures we are surpassed by the Continent and by America. In making comparisons of this kind, it must, however, be remembered that, especially in sole-leather tannage, the most rapid progress has been made during the last few years in those countries which were more backward, and that therefore our superiority is much less pronounced than formerly, and in a few years will probably cease to exist unless marked improvements are introduced in the methods of production.