sect. Fa THE COUNTY OP FIFE* 305 



employed will amount nearly to 5,156. The 

 average quantity of yarn to a piece of 100 yards, 

 will be 24 Spindles ; and therefore the whole 

 linen manufactured will consume 1,237,392 

 spindles of yarn, including the cotton yarn used 

 in the checks and ticks. And allowing 3^ lib. 

 to the spindle, the weight of the flax and cot- 

 ton will be upwards of 4,640,220 libs, or 2071 

 tons. 



The different operations of heckling, spinning, 

 dying, bleaching, winding, and weaving, are 

 computed to require 5^ hands to each loom. 

 But as a considerable quantity of the cloth re- 

 quires neither dyeing nor bleaching, and as many 

 of tl>e people employed in these operations do 

 not apply their whole time to them, but are fre- 

 quently taken off by the necessary avocations of 

 domestic life, we may suppose each loom to re- 

 quire only 4-i- hands. The number of persons, 

 then, young and old, engaged in this business, 

 will amount to 23,192. 



The yarn is partly imported from a foreign 

 market, partly purchased in the neighbouring 

 counties, and partly spun at home. The flax 

 spun at home is partly the produce of the coun- 

 ty, but chiefly imported from Russia and Hol- 

 land. Of the yarn spun at home part is manu- 

 factured by the hand, and part by machinery. 



As mills for spinning flax have been lately 

 introduced into this county, and are of the 

 greatest importance to the linen manufactures, 

 they deserve to be particularly taken notice of. 

 The first erection of these mills was so late as the 

 year 1793, and at that period only three began 

 to do business. Since that time, their number 



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