xxiv 



APPENDIX. 



Liverpool, lias caused me to receive from one of the best judges 

 of Flax in England the following letter : — 



Alma Terrace, Kensington, October 17th, 1863. 

 Dear Sir, — The sample of New Zealand Flax (phormimn tenax) yon have 

 sent me may he worth from £40 to £50 per ton for coarse spinning purposes, but 

 much depends on how it turns out in heckling ; the finer quality is in my 

 opinion worth abont £60 per ton. Yours truly, 



(Signed.) J. E. W. ATKINSON. 



Mr. J. H. Dickson. 



Mr. Atkinson is the retired partner of the firm of Messrs. Hires 

 and Atkinson, Flax-spinners, Leeds, whose yarns are not 

 equalled by any firm in the trade, therefore, such an opinion 

 must be sufficient evidence of the value of my machines and 

 process. 



As a practical man, I am confident that the (Phormium Tenax) 

 New Zealand Flax must come in for the trade of Dundee, over 

 the head of Flax, as jute by itself can never, so long as it is 

 ruined in India by the retting or steeping system, be worked as 

 a warp yarn, unless mixed with Flax. 



My late experiments on the New Zealand Flax has lead to my 

 making the hard plantain or Manilla hemp, that never has been 

 split or heckled, as soft and short as cotton. I sent a sample to 

 Mr. John Crossley, of Halifax, a few weeks ago, as fine and soft 

 as cotton wool. 



I now finish my labours by calling the better attention, and 

 especially the landowners of Ireland, to our own country fibre, 



HOME-GROWN FLAX AND HEMP, COTTONIZED. 

 These materials, which we can grow to any extent in Great 

 Britain and Ireland, at 6d. per lb. or £56 per ton (the 

 average price that the Irish hand-scutched Flax is now selling 

 at this date, 26th of December, 1864, in Armagh, my native 

 city), it will pay farmers to grow it better than a crop of oats, 

 if sown on wheat or barley stubble, and if pulled rather green, 

 not fully ripe, and prepared by my patented macliines and 

 liquid, it can be made as fine as the finest cotton, and when 

 submitted to the process of cottonizing by the machine for 

 shortening it, it will be as easily spun on cotton machinery as 



