22 



FLAX-CROP IN IRELAJv'D. 



These are amongst the most energetic and soul-stirring 

 appeals of those who profess to see no hope of ameliorating 

 the condition of the people, except from the resources of 

 foreign lands. I have quoted them because I conceive that 

 they are equally applicable to promote permanent employ- 

 ment from the resources of our own land, and perhaps may 

 tend to ward off those fatal consequences which must inevitably 

 accrue from the importation of an undue proportion of raw 

 material for our people to manufacture, and of corn for our 

 people to eat. For if such acute and powerful arguments 

 can be advanced to aid a chimerical project, they must acquire 

 a force infinitely greater when applied to the promotion of our 

 OAvn interests rather than to those of foreigners. And I 

 cannot doubt that when despair of finding relief at home shall 

 have given place to hope, these great and comprehensive 

 minds will be devoted to the furtherance of those immea- 

 surably important designs contemplated by the Flax Asso- 

 ciation, which, like a ship just launched, waits an outfit from 

 the benevolent heart and liberal hand, that she may prosecute 

 her voyage to the haven of National Prosperity. 



That the cultivation of so important a plant as Flax should 

 have remained so long neglected, may perhaps be a matter of 

 astonishment. For while the mind of man would vainly 

 compass sea and land to obtain an alleviation of our national 

 distress, the finger of an all-bountiful Creator points to our 

 own soil as the source whence the remedy can alone be 

 derived. 



Flax is cultivated in some parts of England and Scotland, 

 but with so little care and attention that it can only be used 

 for the coarser articles of manufacture, and is not worth half 

 the price per ton that is given by our manufacturers for 

 foreign. The Irish w^ere similarly circumstanced till they 

 formed a society two years since to promote an improved sys- 

 tem of preparation. They engaged Belgian instructors, have 

 succeeded beyond their most sanguine expectations, and have 

 now the gratification of seeing their countrymen employed in 

 preparing and manufacturing a description of flax before 

 unknown in Ireland, and for which immense sums were an- 

 nually paid to foreigners. I wi^s present at this Society's 



