RESTORATIVE, NOT AN EXHAUSTING CROP. 



115 



be allowed to get fully ripe the seed will be better, no doubt, 

 for sowing, and the Flax will not be so oily or good ; therefore, 

 those who want to rear their own seed for sowing had better 

 keep a few ridges or perches to get fully ripe for that purpose. 

 The Max may be Is. 6d. or 2s. 6d. per stone less in value than 

 if pulled more green, but to talk of sacrifice of either is truly 

 absurd. Instead of seed being worse for feeding by being 

 saved a little in the green state, when there is not so much oil 

 in it as when fully ripe, the seed being then more composed 

 of vegetable juice is really better for food. Mr. Stephen 

 might just as well argue that upland hay saved in the green 

 state, when the vegetable sap is all in the stem, WILL BE BAD, 

 as to say that "the oil-cake from such seed MUST BE BAD." 



I deny that it will be so, because of being saved before it 

 abstracts all the oil from the fibre ; and the experiments made 

 in Norfolk, by gentlemen who have tried feeding on home- 

 grown seed and foreign cake, must be sufficient to condemn 

 the assertions of mere theoretical writers. 



I have, by this morning's post, (Nov f 7th, 1845) received 

 the Leeds Intelligencer, from which I copy the following 

 extract: — " In 1830 there was not a Flax-spinning mill in 

 operation in Ireland ; at present there are in Ulster fifty-one 

 in full work, some of them amongst the largest in the United 

 Kingdom. They employ 18,000 persons— there is a million 

 and a quarter of money sunk in the buildings and machinery, 

 and they require a floating capital of £600.000." 



This statement is not altogether correct; Messrs. T. and 

 A. Mulholland, of Belfast, had their large cotton factory, 

 which was burnt down in 1828, rebuilt, and commenced 

 spinning Flax in 1828, — there were two small Flax-spinning 

 mills prior to this near Armagh and Newry, and Messrs. J. 

 Grimshaw and Son, in 1830, turned their print works to Flax- 

 spinning, Messrs. Boomer and Co., with several other printers 

 and cotton-spinners, followed their example, because of the 



