HEMP AND FLAX. 33- 



that encouragement in the price of the commodity. The 

 rise cannot be estimated at less, on an average, than as. a 

 stone from the breaker. Yet this great advance does not 

 extend the cuhivation. In all these articles there is an ap- 

 prehension of the price falUng, if generally gone into. Two 

 shillings a stone -is a bounty of four pounds per acre — but 

 being liable to a fall in price, it has little or no effeO:. 



There are other circumstances which unite to prove, 

 that a bounty, to be efFe6live, must be very large. It would 

 not be easy very greatly to extend the culture without 

 ploughing up grass- lands for the purpose; nothing pre- 

 pares for hemp so well as the land lying under grass; but 

 landlords do not admit grass to be ploughed by tenants | 

 and as the latter would reap all the profit, of course they 

 would give no indulgence where they would reap no ad- 

 vantage. This reduces the obje6l to the grass-lands in the 

 hands of the proprietors, unless the parties were enabled 

 to divide the bounty. 



The land which will produce profitable crops of hemp, 

 is applicable to various other beneficial purposes ; and to 

 induce men who possess such land to vary from their 

 common objects, would demand a very powerful impulse. 

 There seem to be but two ways to give this impulse ; 

 one by a general bounty per acre (per stone would be more 

 liable to fraud) on all hemp that produced 35 stones and 

 upwards per acre : the other, to dispatch intelligent per- 

 sons through all the hemp distri6ls, and others where the 

 soil is rich enough, to form contrails with all persons 

 willing and able to raise the commodity largely; engaging 

 to take all they pioduced, not less than tons, at a 



given price, for five yeurs. 



To engage for such a period would be absolutely neces- 

 sary, for undoubtedly a man would not plough up good 

 grass for any inducement of n shorter duration. 



I do not conceive that a less bounty than 5I. per acre 



would 



