92 



THE GOLDEN FLAX. 



upon the growth and product of our own land, nay in four 

 counties where no manufacture is, to set the greatest part of 

 the poor of England at work ; besides the great advantage it 

 will bring to the owners of the lands ; and the great enriching 

 of the country, by fixing so great a staple trade there, and 

 bringing a multitude of people also, which is and ever will be 

 a great enrichment to the place where they are. Witness the 

 West of England by the woollen manufactures ; and Birming- 

 ham, Stourbridge, Dudley, Walsall, and thereabout for the iron 

 manufactures. And I dare affirm, take Dudley to be the centre 

 of ten miles round, considering the badness of the land, it is 

 there twice as dear as it is in the four counties here named. 

 And within ten miles round Dudley there are more people in- 

 habiting and more money returned in a year than is in these 

 four rich, fat counties I mention. And by this manufacture 

 we should prevent at least tw^o millions of money a year from 

 being sent out of the land for linen cloth, and keep our people 

 at home who now go beyond the seas for want of employment 

 here. For wherever the country is full of people, they are 

 rich ; and where thin, there the place is poor, and all commo- 

 dities cheap." 



Extract from the Belfast Northern Whig. 



THE GOLDEN FLAX. 



Under this title a fabric of linen, cambric, and damask is fostered, 

 which is doing more to raise the standard of good flax, good weaving, 

 and good bleaching, in Ireland, than any other means hitherto adopted. 

 The linen first appeared as a prize fabric, in 1844, when it obtained 

 the medal awarded by " The Flax Improvement Society " in Belfast. 

 The notoriety consequent thereupon excited considerable competition 

 for prizes in the following year, when this symbolically " golden " 

 ' fabric obtained the first medals both for linen and cambric, and the 

 prize pieces of each have recently been presented to her most gracious 

 Majesty, by " the Royal Flax Improvement Society," through their 

 President, the Marquis of Downshire. It was scarcely fair to expose 

 this fabric to the severe test of a third year of competition: but still 

 confidence in its qualities determined the trial. Three pieces of the 

 linen were exhibited at the annual meeting in the past month, and ob- 



