AND WHERE TO FIND ONE. 261 



at 80,000,000 gallons, and of this vast quantity of 

 sweets it is safe to say the free States consume 

 60,000,000 gallons. He goes on to say: &quot;This 

 enormous and increasing consumption of molasses 

 and syrups in our Northern States should encourage 

 the western cane growers in their efforts to produce 

 crops of western cane syrups, with the certainty 

 that they will find a ready sale for all that will be 

 produced of merchantable quality and in good 

 packages.&quot; 



Hemp and flax can be produced in Illinois, of as 

 good a quality as any grown in Europe. Water- 

 rotted hemp, from as far north as Sangamon county, 

 when submitted to Government tests, compared 

 favorably with Russian hemp, and exceeded in 

 strength the standard fixed by the Government, in 

 some instances as high as twenty per cent. Good 

 corn lands are good hemp and flax lands, and there 

 fore we may safely conclude that Illinois can pro 

 duce these important articles much -cheaper than 

 they can be imported. If the fabrication of linen 

 goods has made but little progress in this country, 

 it is because the raw material has been grown in 

 but limited quantities. In many parts of the West, 

 farmers have raised flax simply for the seed, and 

 thrown away the fibre as valueless, under the mis 

 taken idea that flax which produced seed could not 

 be worked into fine linen. In the Chicago market, 

 hemp and flax seed are now sold at from three to 

 five dollars per bushel. The Lockport (N. Y.) Flax 

 Cotton Company have contracted with as many 

 farmers of Niagara county as desired to do so, for 



