1867.] Proceedings of the Asiatic Society. 103 



Report by Mr McCUntock, American Vice- Consul at Bradford, re- 

 specting the Manufacture of u China Grass." 



Consulate of the United States, Bradford^ 

 December 15th, 1865. 



The Chinese have for centuries made, by hand labour, various 

 descriptions of "grass cloth," well known in America and Europe, 

 and often of great strength and beauty, from the fibre of the 

 Boehameria cordata or Urtica nivea 7 known in commerce as Chinese 

 grass. 



Large quantities of the grass have at various times been brought 

 over to England, and probably also to the United States, in the hope 

 of finding a market among the dry goods manufacturers who are 

 always on the look-out for new materials ; but it has hitherto been, 

 and it is even now, found impossible to produce a true " grass cloth" 

 by machinery. The fibre is rather brittle, though very strong, and 

 it is found that the China grass cloth of commerce is only to be 

 woven by hand labour, in which, of course, the Chinese themselves 

 are beyond the reach of competition. Large quantities of the grass 

 have, therefore, been in store in London and elsewhere for years. 

 Some enterprising manufacturer would occasionally purchase a few 

 tons with which to make experiments ; but the only result for a long 

 time was, that he who experimented the most, lost the most. Thousands, 

 and even tens of thousands of pounds were sank by one and another, 

 who each fancied for a time that he had discovered the true method 

 of working up this intractable substance. Whether it was tried in 

 the United States or not, I do not know ; but the concurrent testi- 

 mony of my American friends in the trade is, that no one is now 

 successfully working it at home. Within two or three years past, 

 however, several firms in this neighbourhood have succeeded, by 

 chemical means, in bringing the fibre into a state most closely 

 resembling the best mohair or other bright worsted, and have 

 worked up great quantities of the refined material as a substitute for 

 worsted in many kinds of stuff goods, always, however, in combination 

 with cotton (the warp being of cotton and the weft of the China 

 grass), as they have* not yet been able to work it properly alone. 



The manufacture of worsted goods — that is, of goods made of 

 long-staple wool, as distinguished from short-staple or ordinary wool— 



