80 VEGETABLE SUBSTANCES. 



for spinning are very similar to those practised 

 with flax. The same end is required to be attained 

 that of separating and cleansing the fibres from 

 the woody and gummy matters which adhere to it, 

 and the means used are therefore the same, the time 

 and degree of each operation being proportionate to 

 the different nature of the two fibres. 



The plant is generally dried previously to being 

 watered, but this is objected to by some of the most 

 intelligent cultivators. Mills, in his work on hus- 

 bandry, gives some very excellent reasons for dis- 

 senting from the general practice ; he observes, 

 " Those that are for drying it first, say that the 

 hemp thereby becomes stronger than when it is 

 steeped, without having been previously dried. For 

 my part, I confess that this drying seems to be a 

 needless trouble ; for as it is necessary in the steep- 

 ing of hemp that a certain degree of putrefaction 

 should arise sufficient to destroy the texture of that 

 glutinous substance which connects the fibres to the 

 woody part of the hemp, it certainly is advisable to 

 lay the hemp in water as soon as can be after it is 

 pulled, because the more there is of the natural mois- 

 ture left in this glutinous substance the sooner the 

 putrefaction would begin. If either by design or 

 by accident the hemp has been dried, the putrefac- 

 tion comes on more slowly and unequably, and the 

 fibres contract a hardness which the steeping will 

 not afterwards easily correct*." 



Marcandierf is of the same opinion as the writer 

 just quoted, and farther adds, that hemp newly ga- 

 thered requires only four days immersion in water, 

 but if it has been previously dried, eight or ten 

 days will scarcely suffice to produce a similar effect, 

 and if the water be hard or of a very cold tem- 



* Mills's Husbandry, vol. v. p. 197. 

 f Traite de la Culture du Chanvre. 



