VIII.] ENGLISH STRAW PLAT. 137 



not export the articles of this manufacture ? To Ame- 

 rica we certainly should ; and I should not be at all sur- 

 prised if we were to export them to Leghorn itself. 



R. Notwithstanding all this, however, if the 

 manufacture were of a description to require, in order 

 to give it success, the collecting of the manufacturers 

 together in great numbers, I should, however great 

 the wealth that it might promise, never have done 

 any thing to promote its establishment. The contra- 

 ry is happily the case : here all is not only performed 

 by hand,. but by hand singly, without any combina- 

 tion of hands. Here there is no power of machinery 

 or of chemistry wanted. All is performed out in the 

 open fields, or sitting in the cottage. There wants 

 no coal mines and no rivers to assist; no water-pow- 

 ers nor powers of fire. No part of the kingdom is 

 unfit for the business. Every -where there are grass, 

 water, sun, and women and children's fingers ; and 

 these are all that are wanted. But, the great thing 

 of all is this ; that, to obtain the materials for the ma- 

 king of this article of dress, at once so gay, so useful, 

 and in some cases so expensive, there requires not a 

 'penny of capital. Many of the labourers now make 

 their own straw hats to wear in summer. Poor rot- 

 ten things, made out of straw of ripened grain. 

 With what satisfaction will they learn that straw, 

 twenty times as durable, to say nothing of the beau- 

 ty, is to be got from every hedge ? In short when 

 the people are well and clearly informed of the facts, 

 which I have through you, Sir, had the honour to lay 

 before the Society,*. it is next to impossible that the 

 manufacture should not become general throughout 

 the country. In every labourer's house a pot of wa- 

 ter can be boiled. What labourer's wife cannot, in 

 the summer months, find time to cut and bleach grass 

 enough to give her and her children work for a part of 

 the winter? There is no necessity for all to be platters. 

 Some may cut |ind bleach only. Others may prepare 

 the straw, as mentioned in paragraph L. of this let- 

 ter. And doubtless, as the farmers in Hertfordshire 

 now sell their straw to the platters, grass collector* 

 12* 



