416 [Assembly 



4th. Great care and judgment must be shown in the selection 

 of proper seed, as on this point rests the chief success of the crap. 



5th. The value of the fibre, and its consequent profit, depend 

 upon the mode of watering it. If the putrefactive process is 

 proceeded with too far, the fibrous, and also the mucilaginau* 

 part of the bark will be affected. 



6th. If it remains a few hours too long in the water, the fibre 

 will be weak and brittle ; and if three hours too short, it will 

 not separate from the stem easily, and will consequently be 

 coarse. 



7th. Endemic fevers are always more or less common in flax 

 districts. 



8th. It is a very hazardous crop, as there is always great va- 

 riation in the market value ; sometimes it bears a high price, and 

 at other times is scarcely remunerative. These objections do 

 not apply to oui* Western alluvial soils, that can be purchased 

 for one dollar per acre, and that will yield a succession of crops 

 annually for some years without manure — but to those like mine, 

 that have been under cultivation for more than a century, and 

 which do require manuring for a crop. 



Recent discoveries have been made in England in the manu- 

 facture of flax, which that government thinks will enable Great 

 Britain to declare herself entirely independent of our Southern 

 States for her raw material, cotton. Chevalier Claussen has dis- 

 covered a mode of operating immediately upon the flax as it 

 comes from the field, or upon the fibre after it has been cleared 

 by mechanical means from tlie woody portions of the plant, 

 making a more entire separation of the resinous substance than 

 by the modes now in use in this country, such as dew rotting, 

 &c., aforementioned, which require some weeks. Mr. Claussen, 

 by means of chemistry, is said to accomplish this desirable end, 

 without deteriorating the material, in less than three hours. He 

 gets rid of the elasticity and harshness of the fibres by splitting 

 them into strips, until their gravity is less than that of cotton, 

 and appear exceedingly like it. By this process flax may be 

 grown and manufactured as cheap, if not cheaper, than cotton. 



