304 DICKSON ON 



still less in proportion to the quantity of Flax raised than it is 

 at present, and the seed taken off the straw usually turned out 

 unfit for sowing ; spring supplies were, consequently, almost 

 solely made up from foreign importations. At the end of 

 1808, and when the Duke of Portland, Lords Bathurst and 

 Castlereagh, were the leading trio of Downing Street, an 

 order in Council was issued, which showed considerable nar- 

 row-mindedness, relative to British trade with America. That 

 movement gave so much offence to Brother Jonathan that, in 

 a fit of retaliation, he laid an embargo on all exports from 

 America to the United Kingdom. Of course, Flax-seed was 

 among the prohibited articles, and, as the supplies previously 

 forwarded had run up to 30,000 or 35,000 hogsheads, the 

 embargo caused no little alarm among the people of Ulster. 

 Unfortunately, too, it occurred that at the very same period, 

 the respective monarchs of Russia and Holland had also set 

 up the barricades, thus giving no hope of any quantity of Riga 

 or Dutch seed coming forward. 



Under such a state of affairs, -we need scarcely say that 

 the Ulster agriculturists were placed in the most awkward 

 position. They had made the usual preparations for the Flax 

 crop, and just at the critical time when the supplies from 

 America, Russia, and Holland, should have been coming 

 forward, they found matters in the most unfavourable con- 

 dition. On the 27th of December, 1808, a meeting of the 

 leading merchants and drapers connected with the linen-trade 

 was held at Armagh, for the purpose of sending petitions to 

 the King and the Commons, praying for an immediate altera- 

 tion of the orders in Council. That meeting was attended by 

 Mr. John Hancock, Mr. John S. Ferguson, Mr. Christy, Mr. 

 Phelps, Mr. Robert Williamson, and a host of others then 

 largely engaged as linen merchants, drapers, and bleachers; 

 but no definite arrangements were effected. Two or three 

 weeks afterwards a second meeting was held, and at that 



