of December, in the first year, afterwards the contracts would be 

 made in July and August, in subsequent years. This seed should 

 arrive from Europe during February, in time to be segregated 

 and delivered to the farmers to be sown under their contracts from 

 the middle of March to the middle of April, according to the 

 weather conditions. 



The flax would be ready for pulling in July and dried and 

 delivered to the mill in August. In the meantime the necessary 

 buildings, machinery and manufacturing plant would be got in 

 readiness. Work of retting and scutching would start up in the 

 middle of August and by THE MIDDLE OF SEPTEMBER, 15 TO 

 20 TONS OF FLAX FIBER, WORTH FROM $5,000 to $10,000 

 WOULD BE READY FOR SHIPMENT TO EUROPE, TO BE 

 FOLLOWED EVERY MONTH BY SIMILAR SHIPMENTS 

 OF FIBER, until the following August, when the season's supply 

 of straw would be worked up and the sheds empty and ready to 

 receive the next season's crop. 



Cash returns could be received here from Belfast or other 

 European markets in sixty days or less after each shipment. 



Note here under this arrangement three-fourths of the 

 material on hand in August would be worked up and sold and 

 shipped before the assessor's visit in March. 



Third — A READY MARKET. — The disastrous condition of 

 the flax industry, owing to the European war, the market for the 

 high grade fiber producible on Puget Sound, is open to gobble 

 all the flax we can produce. 



In this treatise I have aimed to adopt what seemed to me 

 the best points in each system and combined them into one har- 

 monious whole, which, if followed closely, will not fail to enable 

 the prospective flax grower to produce good results. There are 

 three classes, however, that this book is specially intended for, 

 and to whom I trust it will prove instructive and interesting. 

 First, the prospective flax grower, entirely ignorant of the sub- 

 ject, but is willing to follow the instructions here given. He need 

 have no fear of failure, but be fully assured of success. Second, 

 the man who has some knowledge of the subject, but has forgot- 

 ten many details of the work and approaches the subject in a 

 teachable spirit. These instructions will prove of benefit. Third, 

 the flax grower who thinks he knows it all, a man at the very 

 best, very hard to deal with, however, by keeping a tight rein on, 

 to keep him from kicking over the traces, if growing flax under 

 contract, may be made to benefit thereby. There is one other 

 class into whose hands this book may come. The man who not 

 only thinks he knows it all, but goes a step farther and thinks 

 he knows just a little more than it all. For him 1 have no use. 

 He can gang his own gate ! 



The subject of co-operative flax culture is one of much in- 

 terest and calls for some marks in this place. By co-operation I 

 mean the farmer not only growing the flax for the scutcher, but 

 also turning in his straw on joint account to be worked up by the 

 scutcher in a manner somewhat similar to our furnishing milk 



