260 



tlemea have a patent right to a process of rotting in hot water in vats, and of 

 other matters connected with the preparation of flax, the advantage of which is, 

 that the work can go on during winter, and the flax is rotted in less time. In 

 1840, I tried to persuade some of the manufacturers in Belfast, Ireland, to make 

 experiments with flax in the hot water running from their mills, keeping up the 

 temperature by a steam pipe, and got rather ridiculed about it. In 1846, the 

 late Mr. Schenck arrived from America with the identical process " patented," 

 and it has since succeeded well in Ireland where the climate makes the usual 

 method very tedious. My opinion is, that this American process is good for 

 Ireland, and my Irish process good for America ; but we shall see at om* next 

 State Fair, when I hope I shall not be the only comjjetitor for a prize as I was 

 at Janesville. 



In the old country flaxseed is never sown on the same ground, with advantage, 

 but once in six or seven years. Here I would venture it in five, and on rich 

 bottom land in less. It is not an exhausting crop, where there is good farming 

 and a proper rotation of crops. Wheat has been bad since I commenced opera- 

 tions, but it was quite as good on the flax land as any where else. Nothing can 

 better clean and prepare the land for winter wheat than a pre\'ious crop of flax. 



There is a ready market at the East alone for a large quantity of flax, and the 

 spinners are anxious to encourage the culture out West, as many of them import 

 from Holland, Belgium, Russia, and Ireland, most of their consumption. By 

 the last statistical report I have at hand, I perceive that 990 tons of Foreign 

 flax were imported into the United States, and some new mills have been erected 

 since then. 



I am not yet prepared to answer one of your queries as to the profits of flax- 

 raising over other crops, and the information would be of little practical use if I 

 could give it. The management of flax is a trade that must be learned like any 

 other ; no matter what the profits may be, they are not to be obtained by every 

 one who rushes into the culture of flax with only paper instructions to guide him. 

 I well remember the outcry raised against the Belfast Society by numbers who 

 failed though following, as they thought, the Society's printed instructions to the 

 very letter ; that Society never did any good till it adopted the plan of sending 

 instructors, instead of instructions, through the country. 



I have given you rather a disjointed and rambling story this time, but I hope to 

 have more practical information and statistics for your second volume, meantime 

 with a cordial invitation to all interested in flax to come and see my works, and 



judge for themselves. 



Yours, very faithfully, 



JOHN GALBRAITH. 

 To Albert C. Ingham, Esq. 



Sec. of the Wis. State Agr. Society. 



