CULTURE OF FLAX.. 155 



nufafture in all its branches with the mod attention, agree 

 there is no greater improvement to be \vifhed for, than the 

 railing the flax inftead of importing foreign. It is much to 

 be lamented, that the flax-hufbandry has not made a greater 

 progrefs in the kingdom j for the profit of it is very great. 

 The minutes of the tour furnifh the following particulars: 



From hence we find, that the profit is near feven pounds 

 an acre, clear, after paying large expcnces, and that on the 

 Cunningham acre. 



There is a notion common in the north of Ireland, which I 

 fhould fuppofe muft be very prejudicial to the quality as well 

 as the quantity of flax produced ; it is, that rich land will not 

 do for it, and that the foil {hould be pretty much exhaufted 

 by repeated crops of oats, in order to reduce it to a proper 

 ftate for flax. The confequcnce of this is, as I every where 

 faw full crops of weeds, and of poor half-ftarved flax : the 

 idea is abfurd ; there is no land in the north of Ireland that 

 I aw too rich for it. A very rich foil fown thin produces a 

 branching harfli flax, but if very clear of weeds, and fowa 

 thick for the ftems to draw each other up, the crop will be in 

 goodnefs, and quantity proportioned to the richnefs of the 

 land. A poor exhaufted foil cannot produce a flax of a ftrong 

 good (laple ; it is the nourifliment it receives from the fertility 

 of the land which fills the plant with oil, and bleachers very 

 well know that the oil is the flrengtb of the ftaple, and unfor- 

 tunately it is. that bleathing c.iuuot be performed without an 



exhalation 



