CONSUMPTION OF FLAX. 139 
1,200,000 tons of straw, producing six bushels of seed to each 
ton, at 6s. 6d. a bushel, would give Fi . . £2,340,000 
150,000 tons of fibre, at £50 a ton, would give - . 7,500,000 
£9,840,000.” 
Without advocating, or considering it desirable, that all the 
increasing quantities of Flax required by our manufacturers 
should be, or can be grown in this country, we may take advan- 
tage of the information collected as applicable to other coun- 
tries. It has, indeed, been objected, by Mr. H. S. Thompson, 
that if forty stone of Flax (value 7s. 6d. per stone) is the average 
produce of a reasonably well cultivated acre of Flax, 70,000 tons 
of imported Flax would require 280,000 acres of land for its 
cultivation, which is “clean and in good tilth,”’ i.e., “ precisely 
in the state in which it is best fitted for producing corn,” and 
‘fon an average at least four quarters.” ‘The 280,000 acres 
required to produce the Flax now imported, would therefore 
produce, if cropped with wheat, 1,120,000 quarters, worth (at 
7s. per bushel) £3,136,000; which approaches tolerably near 
to the estimate given by Mr. Nichols of the value of the im- 
ported Flax, viz., £3,490,000.”” But these objections are made 
to the occupation of good land in a country like England, 
where the whole quantity is but limited, and “where every 
acre of even moderate fertility has its work to do, and no new 
crop can be introduced without displacing an old one ;” but do 
not apply, as stated, to countries like America and Australia, 
where there may be an unlimited extent of fertile but unculti- 
vated land. Nor, indeed, to many parts of India, where more 
corn is grown than is required by the people, and for which 
they would gladly substitute some readily saleable or exportable 
product. Further— 
“Tf we refer to the statistics of British and Irish exports, we 
find that in 1843 there were shipped from the United Kingdom, 
in round numbers, 91,000,000 yards of linen, and that the ex- 
ports of 1853 reached nearly 130,000,000 yards; the total 
value of all kinds of linen and yarn exported in the former 
year being £3,702,052, and in the latter £5,910,355.” (‘ Belfast 
Mercury.’) 
Though the culture of Flax is considered by some as not 
particularly eligible for the best-cultivated lands of England, it 
