cheaper classes of woollen goods, which are chiefly made in European Russia.
The Mongols bestow no care on the improvement of the wool from their flocks. They keep the best wool for themselves, and, mixing it with horsehair, manufacture it into felt for their tents, while they sell only the dirtiest and hairiest qualities. The Russian and Chinese wool merchants in Mongolia, therefore, are compelled to wash all the wool they purchase, and this wool-washing is the only industry which the Mongolian plateau produces.
The price of wool in Mongolia has risen steadily for many years past, and the amount exported has more than doubled since 1900. In 1910, 97,142 pouds (1561 tons), valued by the customs at 8¾ roubles a poud (8½d. per lb.), passed the Koshogatch post by the north-western caravan route. Professor Soboleff states that prices in Uliassutai have risen from 1 rouble 70 kopeks per poud (½d. per lb.) in 1908 to 5 roubles per poud (3⅔d. per lb.) in 1910. In the same year the writer saw wool in North-West Mongolia offered by Mongolian flock-owners in exchange for manufactured goods and silver advances at the rate of from 2 to 4 roubles per poud (1½d. to 2½d. per lb.). The price of Mongolian wool in Biisk during 1910 ranged from 8 roubles 57 kopeks to 9 roubles 10 kopeks per poud (5¾d. to 6½d. per lb.), including the cost of transport from Mongolia.
The development of the Australian wool trade, which has so long affected the European wool markets, and has kept down wool prices throughout the world, seems to have had no adverse effect on Mongolian wool. On the contrary, it appears that the cheap-
