5 6 Report of the Bvitijh Cotiful in Pri/JJta, Jan, 



as it produces the fame effc6t in Icfs time, but becaufe run- 

 ning and fpring water mak-j the harl red and towey : And large 

 bodies ot Itagnant water are preferred to fmall, becaufe they 

 have been found to give a whiter or cleaner colour : But fifh- 

 ponds mull be avoided, becaufe the fifli would be thereby de- ' 

 llroyed ; as alfo fuch places as cattle are watered at, if they 

 are fo fmall as that the whole mafs may be thereby impreg- 

 nated, becaufe fuch water is held to be both unwholefome 

 and unpalatable for them. 



Of the different kinds of bottoms or foil, on which fuch 

 pieces of water ftand, the muddy or flimy is preferred, and 

 fuch only as are particularly prejudicial avoided, being either 

 niorafly, from being metallic, or appearing to contain cold 

 fprings. 



In the fouthern provinces of Poland, as Volkinia, Podolla, 

 ^c. which have the beft foil and climate for the production 

 of thefe articles, but which, for want of a water-communica- 

 tion with the Baltic, have been hitherto leafl cultivated, the 

 mode of deeping is i-.ot praclifed at all, on the fuppofition 

 that the harl is thereby weakenedj and the colour darkened. 

 But when it is obferved, on the one handy that ileeping can on- 

 ly have fuch pernicious effetts when injudicioully or impro- 

 perly managed \ as, for example, by ufing hard inttead of foft 

 water, or letting it lye too long in the fteep \ and, on the other, 

 that, when dried, inftead of being fteept, it is impoffible to fe- 

 fparate the harl from the rind of tlie flax, or from the ftalk of 

 the hemp, without breaking, confequently without fliortening 

 it j nor with fo little labour ; confequently at fo fmall an, ex- 

 pence (that of the ileeping taken into the fcale), as if it had 



been ivatered inllcad of being dried there feems to be lefs 



doubt of the mode of fteeping being preferable, fince it is, in 

 the climates in which thefe articles are cultivated of the bell 

 qu.niity, and to the greateft extent, almofl univerfally pracr 

 tifed ; and that the method moll generally adopted cannot but 

 be fuppofed to be the bell. 



9. After being taken cut of the fteep, and (landing a few 

 hours on end, to let the water run oft, the flax is fpread out 

 on a grafs field, where it cannot touch the earth, 14 days on 

 the one fide, and 14 days on the other, then gathered toge- 

 tiier, fet up in fmall flacks, and there left (landing until per- 

 fe6lly dry ;'but' the hemp, inftead of being fpread out on a 

 field, is fet up againfl the walls or palings, until it is likewife 

 quite dry ; and then both are houfcd in fuch fituations, as 

 to be expofed as much as poiTible to a free draught of air ; but 

 neither to any the leaft wet from without, nor dampnefs from 

 within ; becaufe fo much of thern as might fufFcr from either 

 \ . the 



