No. 149.] 417 



By the old process, cotton would take precedence. Eleven 

 pounds of cotton, worth 88 cents, may be spun to produce 20,000 

 yards, about 3,800 yards more than eleven pounds of flax would 

 yield. The manufacturer could afford to sell the cotton yarn for 

 ten and a half pence per pound, when he could not sell the flax 

 yarn for less than seventeen and a half pence per pound. By 

 Mr. Claussen's process, however, the tables are turned. He 

 increases the produce of flax 99 per cent, over the old mode, and 

 it is supposed to a much greater extent. 



It has another very decided advantage, which is that the flax 

 may remain standing until entirely ripe, yielding its seed, &c., 

 as the riper and coarser it is, the better. 



News by the last steamer from Europe informs us that cloth 

 has been recently manufactured in Great Britain, fifty-four inches 

 wide, of good quality, composed of wool and flax. They like- 

 wise make cloth of cotton, one-half flax, and a quarter cotton, 

 and .the balance flax. A Manchester editor asserts that doubts 

 have been expressed whether cotton and flax mixed would re- 

 ceive a uniform dye. He says he has seen samples of the yarn 

 dyed, and that the colors were uniform, perfect and in every way 

 unexceptionable. So early as 1783, the British Government of- 

 fered bounties for the growth of flax. In 1785, there was im- 

 ported from Russia, in British ships, 17,695 tons. 



It is said that pure flax fibre, equal to the finest cotton yarns, 

 have been produced upon cotton machinery now existing. 



The consumption of cotton last year in Manchester alone was 

 more than 770,000,000 of pounds — equal to one thousand tons 

 per day. The conclusion the Manchester manufacturers have 

 come to, as the result of their experiments, is that flax may be 

 substituted for'one-half, at least, of this enormous quantity ; and 

 in order to supply the Manchester manufacturers to this extent, 

 the produce of two thousand acres of flax would be required daily, 

 which would equal seven hundred thousand acres per annum. 



I will venture to assert that the whole amount of flax grown 

 in Ireland, Scotland, England and WaleS; does not amount to 

 [Assembly, No. 149.] BB 



