
THE FLAX PLANT. 287 
his predecessors in exciting attention, and his processes have been described 
by several chemists of reputation in England, as affording a new and beauti- 
ful application of the powers of chemistry to practical purposes. In every 
part of Europe, indeed, much interest has been excited by the accounts which 
have been published respecting his discoveries, which were regarded as cal- 
culated to render Great Britain nearly altogether independent of foreign 
supplies of cotton. The proposals of M. Claussen were not confined to cot- 
tonizing flax, but also embraced a method of preparing long-line or fibre for 
the flax-spinner, substituting for fermentation the more rapid action of a 
weak solution of caustic soda, followed by boiling, or simple immersion in 
water, acidulated with sulphuric or muriatic acid. The material employed 
for the production of his cotton was at first unsteeped flax-straw; but at 
present I find that the flax in its original state is not used, and that the 
refuse tow of the scutch-mills is preferred. This limitation of the application 
of M. Claussen’s patent removes some of the objections which were urged 
against his original proposal to cut up valuable flax, so as to produce what 
the opponents of the invention regarded as an inferior article ; now, however, 
it is merely the waste tow of the scutching-mill, which can be purchased at 
from £4 to £7 per ton, that is used in M. Claussen’s establishments: and 
from this, as the interesting series of samples which have been kindly 
supplied to me by Dr. Ryan show, a beautiful material, capable, it is stated, 
not merely of being spun with cotton machinery, but of being combined 
with wool, silk, and other fibres, and exhibiting, apparently, that increased 
affinity for colouring matters which Mr. Mercer has found to be possessed 
by cotton fibre, acted upon by caustic alkali, has been obtained. The first 
operation at M. Claussen’s works is to pass the tow through a carding and 
hackling machine, for the purpose of arranging its fibres parallel; so straight- 
ened, it is cut by another machine (somewhat similar in its operations to the 
chaff-cutter of the farmer) into pieces of about one and a half inch in 
length, and is then conveyed to the steeping vats. The vats are placed side 
by side; and by means of a cradle and a travelling railway, the tow can be 
transferred from one to the other, as required. It is, in the first place, 
steeped for twenty-four hours in a cold solution of caustic soda, of 1° Twad- 
del. The next step is to plunge it in another vat containing a similar solution, 
but furnished with a steam-pipe, so that the liquid can be kept at a boiling 
temperature for two hours. - The peculiar part of the process, or the Claus- 
senizing of the tow, is commenced by transferring the material prepared, as 
described, to a third vat, which holds a solution containing 5 per cent. 
carbonate of soda. It is allowed to remain immersed about an hour, so as to 
be completely saturated with this liquid, and is then raised from the vat and 
placed in a solution vontaining about one-half per cent. of sulphuric acid. 
In the bath of sulphuric acid it is alleged that important chemical and me- 
chanical changes are effected in the character of the flax fibre. It is stated 
that it becomes at once changed, as if “ by a new instance of natural magic,” 
from a damp aggregation of flax to a light expansive mass of cottony texture, 
increasing in size, like leavening dough or an expanding sponge; and this 
material, it is asserted, can be produced at a cost not exceeding 214d. per Ib., 
which is considerably below the price at which cotton can be grown and 
imported from the United States or any other cotton-producing country. 
By a simple process of bleaching, and subsequently “carding,” the tow thus 
modified assumes both the texture and appearance of foreign cotton, and can 
at once be employed by the cotton-spinner. 
With such alleged advantages to recommend it, it was not wonderful that 
M. Claussen’s proposal attracted the attention and excited the sympathies of 
Mr. Porter and other eminent ceconomists, and that the late Lord Lieutenant 
