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DICKSON ON 



machinery, to be spun on cotton machinery, and as by such 

 production, if successful, we not only create employment that 

 must lead to be permanent for the thousands that are now in 

 distress in Lancashire, but we introduce new and additional 

 material for the clothing of our people, that were formerly 

 depending on the Southern States of America; should we not 

 seize on this auspicious moment of proving by our own 

 immediate action, that the manufacturing industry of 

 Lancashire will no longer be depending on material coming 

 from a country, whose people, from misunderstanding created 

 between themselves, revenge their misfortunes and blood- 

 letting propensities on our trade and our well-conducted 

 operatives, by burning the material, cotton, rather than we 

 should have it, because we very wisely refused to join either 

 disputants, in an unholy, unchristian, and barbarous war. 



If the reader has any desire to understand what is the 

 real advantage of a country producing from its own soil 

 material for its manufacturers, in preference to sending away 

 --our gold in millions for cotton, I beg to submit for perusal the 

 following facts and proofs that I hope may be found deserving 

 of notice : — 



In The Times, about two months ago, it was reported that 

 there was produced last year in Ulster four millions worth of 

 Flax, by a population of two millions. Now, it must be 

 observed, that in place of Flax, £4,000,000 had been 

 produced from 61,400 acres of wheat, barley, or oats, the 

 whole, in all probability, would have been shipped to England 

 for that amount in gold ; but no, the home produce Flax 

 remained to give employment to other classes than farmers, in 

 the happy and industrious community of Ulster ; and it must 

 be evident to farmers, that by producing that four millions 

 worth of Flax to be worked up by their spinning and manu- 

 facturing neighbours, that they are not only better paid in the 

 first instance, than if they had grown a crop of grain, but that 



