REMARKS ON THE FLAX SUBJECT. 



149 



as his few years may mean twenty or fifty, whereas some 

 might imagine them to be not more than five or six years. 

 However, it is well known that the parliamentary grant that 

 was given to encourage the Flax and Linen-trade in Ireland, 

 was withdrawn in 1828 — although a committee of the House 

 of Commons reported that the faith of Great Britain had been 

 pledged to this country for its continuance. 



"After the professor informs the readers of his 6 common 

 sense ' production, that ' Flax can be grown in an unlimited 

 quantity in the north and south of Europe and America,' etc., 

 another old lady's story, he goes on to say : — ' If we are not 

 then to lay a tax on these materials of important manufactures 

 '(which no one would think of doing) the foreign growers 

 must possess the same market as ourselves —namely, our own ; 

 and we can no more contend with them in cheapness of 

 production in these commodities than in any other produce 

 of the land. Some speculative persons have been lately 

 amusing themselves and deceiving others, with calculations of 

 enormous profits, not less, it is believed, than £20 or £25 the 

 acre to be got by producing Flax. It would be very easy 

 to show those gentlemen that they have left out some of the 

 most necessary elements of their calculation. But it must be 

 pretty evident, one would think, that if a profit could be made 

 of £20 or £25 the acre by raising Flax in England, the 

 growers of Poland and other countries of the Baltic, who can 

 raise it as well as we can, would not long leave us in possession 

 of so profitable a monopoly. The "Dutch will undertake to 

 supply us with any quantity we choose to consume, and the 

 Dutch farmers certainly do not make £20 or £25 an acre by 

 cultivating lint. 



"In England enormous bounties were in use, to be given to 

 the farmers to induce them to cultivate lint, but the farmers 

 continued obstinately to think they were paid better by 

 cabbages and wheat. In Scotland the system of bounties 



