70 TLAX. 



stances, such as the quality of the flax itself, the way in 

 which it has been steeped and dried, and even the state 

 of the weather, much damp being unfavourable, as also 

 would too sharp a drought, though the latter inconveni- 

 ence is rare in Great Britian, and still more so in Ireland. 

 To the scutcher, who is paid by the weight scutched, and 

 not by the day, it makes a considerable difference in his 

 earnings whether these circumstances are favourable or 

 adverse. Thus, French scutchers, at two pence the kilo 

 (short for Idlogramme, and equal to 2'206 English pounds 

 avoirdupois), can earn from eight pence to twenty pence 

 a day, according to their skill and the quality of the flax 

 they have to do with. 



The niceness of the scutching operation is shown by 

 the fact that its proper performance by machinery has 

 never yet been accomplished. "We do not say that it 

 never will be ; probably it will, for there is scarcely a 

 limit to the powers of machinery. Hitherto, when flax 

 is scutched by machinery, the two ends only are properly 

 done, the middle remaining imperfectly finished off. In 

 some cases, the loss occasioned by scutching by machinery, 

 instead of by hand, has been as much as twenty-five per 

 cent. Mr. Warnes, to whose praiseworthy attempts wo 

 have a pleasure in referring, says at first, that " we must 

 wait with patience till our labourers have learned the art 

 of using the scut chin g-mill, before we, or they, can fully 

 reap the benefit ;" but he afterwards declares, that having 

 spared neither trouble nor expense in testing the com- 

 parative merits of hand and of mill scutching, he finds 

 that the scale is at present in favour of the former. In 

 fact, no foreign flaxman would listen for a moment to the 

 proposition of scutching by machinery. 



VALUE OF FLAX TO THE COMMUNITY AT LAEOE. 



The value of the flax crop, in a national point of view, 

 arises from the unfailing employment which the scutching 

 gives for many months in the year. "When a young man 

 has once learned the trade, if he subsequently thinks fit 



