FLAX CANNOT BE WOVEN BY MACHINERY. 



279 



with astonishing rapidity, and quickly overtop the small 

 weeds. It is necessary, however, to remove the larger, but 

 much injury is often done in the attempt to eradicate the 

 smaller. 



The first week of March to the middle of April is the best 

 time for sowing ; if deferred two or three weeks longer, the 

 stalks will, in most cases, be short and of little value, though 

 the produce of seed per acre may equal the early sown. 



The editor of the ' Farmer's Herald ' observes that — 



The recent establishment of societies in Ireland, as well 

 as in several parts of England, for , promoting the growth of 

 flax, leads most naturally to the consideration, how far the ma- 

 nufacture of cotton may be replaced by that of linen. * * * * 

 Flax may surely be as cheaply grown here as cotton may be 

 imported: and if the manufacture of it is not more costly, 

 why may not British skill and enterprise be exerted to supply 

 the world with a fabric more beautiful, more durable, and 

 therefore more desirable, than cotton ? The more a nation can 

 produce of those articles which the world requires, the more 

 wealthy that nation will by consequence become : now, could 

 we grow cotton, as well as manufacture it, we should be richer 

 by all those vast sums paid every year for the raw material."^ 



It is certain that flax can be grown in this country to any 

 extent, and that it must ever be the interest of the owners and 

 occupiers of the soil to supply the demand; thus enabling 

 our manufacturers to compete with the cotton trade, and 

 rendering them real, instead of nominal exporters of linen. 

 Spinning -mills would be erected in every populous district, 

 hand-loom weavers find ample employment, markets be opened 

 to the farmer for the sale of flax, and the suffering poor be 

 emancipated through the multitudinous occupations arising 

 from the inestimable flax-plant. Nor let it be supposed that 

 I indulge in empty theories : for flax cannot, like cotton^ be 

 woven by the power-loom, and the erection of spinning-mills 

 in one populous and distressed locality is already in contem- 

 plation ; particulars of which, with recent accounts of profits 



