CO MISCELLANEOUS. 



MISCELLANEOUS. 



MATERIALS FOR TEXTILE FABRICS. 



The late Paris Exhibition contained ample proof that the colonics of Great 

 Britain could produce an inexhaustible supply of vegetable fibres adequate to all 

 the requirements of cur textile manufactures In lieu of the flax and hemp of Russia 

 of which the war is to a large extent depriving u9. When the supply of rags fell 

 short of the demand for paper-making, attention was turned to the vegi table king- 

 dom for a substitute, and not one, but many ligneous fibres were speediiy discov- 

 ered, of acknoH lodged suitableness for the purpose. Thepapei however, 

 found that, in order to take advantage of these discoveries, expensive alterations 

 would be required i binery ; and in the me; s supply 

 of rags, which had been kept up on the Continent in the expectation of increased 

 prices from the demand for cl papers, has become sufficient for ordinary 

 wants; althi ~< : ietors have not been relieved of the extra price 

 laid upon thei iring the scarcity of rags. The capability of India to sup- 

 ply tli is country with substitutes for Russian flax and hemp, wi rated in 

 the collection of pi Paris by Dr. Royle; and a corresponding 

 collection from Jamaica, prepared by Mr. X. Wilson, of the Botanic Garden in that- 

 island, exhibited an equal capability on the part of our colonics i ' Indies. 

 There is now a reasonable jr aspect that their staple product, will no longer 

 be an unrcraunerative article of produce. But with the revival, as we fondly trust, 

 of the prosperity of these fine colonies, the proprietors have an opportunity of push- 

 ing their enterprise into other and more lucrative fields of production. The Kcw 

 Garden Mi for November, edited by Sir W. J. Hooker, contains extracts 

 from a report on the Jamaica Botanic Garden, deserving the careful 

 of pioprietors in that island. The report bears testimony to the incn 

 for growing new plants and adopting new staples in Jamaica, as well as for a more 

 extended and varied cultivation of the island, in order to meet th tea ol its 

 altered conditio:). Numerous plants have been introduced by Mr. Wilson, who has 

 their fitness for the soil and climate, and who finds that the island now 

 " possesses the finest fibres and the greatest number of textile p'ants in the world, 

 hitherto of no avail in the country in general, and held of little value by individuals, 

 but which may now be turned to the greatest account in a national point of view." 

 No fewer than fifty-one of the samples of fibres shown at Paris from Jamaica were 

 the products of plants indigenous to the island, and all suited mo. ir textile 



in the coarse cocoa-nut coir to filaments rich as those of the fii 

 We subjoin an extract from this important and seasonable report: — 



For the Plantain, Pinguin, and all similar herbaceous plai inery is 



separate and clean the fibre advantageously.; when this 

 desideratum is accomplished, and with one or two years' \ i i nothing 



to prevent Jamaica competing with any part of the world of t 

 extent. The inducement to do so cannol I reaterthani sent. I 



ecount, that the imports of flax into the United Kingdom 

 during 1853,: to 94,163 ; b., and, at the exl price of 



£110 per ton, to which the average price of foreign flax h; 

 a sum of £10,! has been paid in cash f ir foi 



and since the ' m of Russian hemp into European m sea ami 



demand arc incus 



