FLAX. 



The head II weighs eight pounds, or thereabouts, and is ten 

 inches in length, and three inches and three-quarters thick. 

 The lower jaw consists of four stout wooden teeth, not 

 wedge-shaped, the intervals between which receive the 

 three teeth of the upper jaw. "When the braque is 

 closed, the head H rests on the solid slab, or under gum, 

 Gr. The whole machine is made of apple-wood, as being 

 a hard, tough, and weighty material ; and stands firmly 

 on four wooden legs, which are fixed into blocks of stone, 

 to resist the constant shock of the machine. 



; jf The workman, having malleted 



his flax, and laid it in hand- 

 fuls close to the break, with his 

 right hand seizes the pole, P, 

 close to the head, H, and with 

 his left hand introduces the 

 handful to be broken, and crushes 

 it till he thinks he has pounded 

 it enough. 



After each handful has been 

 well crunched and tasted, as it 

 were, by the wooden palate of 

 the braque, it is tossed, after a 

 twist, to the foot of the scutch- 

 ing-board, and the scutching pro- 

 per then begins. 



The ecouclie-pied, or scutching- 

 board, is an upright plank (see 

 fiys. 12 and 13), fifty-one inches 

 high, fourteen broad, and with a 

 uniform thickness of three- 

 quarters of an inch 

 throughout, firmly 

 fixed in a solid block 

 of wood, B. At the 

 height of thirty- 

 seven and a half 

 inches from the 



Fig. 12. Front view of the Scutcliing-board 

 or Ewuclie-pied. 



foot, is a horizon- 



