ON HEMP. 



209 



advertisement, which specified the mode in which it is to be pre- 

 pared. 



The letters from the several Residents above-mentioned, con- 

 taining the objections that were urged against the mode of prepara- 

 tion laid down by Mr. Fleming, having been submitted to that gen- 

 tleman's perusal, he addressed a letter to the Board of Trade, in 

 reply thereto ; in which, in regard to watering, he observed, that 

 although forty hours' steeping might, perhaps, be found too little, 

 yet certainly three or four days was too much. The exact period 

 must be ascertained by experience. 



The Board, of Trade accordingly issued fresh directions, allow- 

 ing the Residents a latitude to deviate from the original Instructions 

 as to watering, as in their own discretion they should see fit. 



It has been mentioned, under the head of Drying before 

 Watering, that Mr. Frushard failed in his intended experiment of 

 preparing Sunn after the Native and the European modes of prac- 

 tice. He again argues, from the experiment of the white line 

 made from Buddaul Sunn, that the arcanum of giving strength to 

 the fibre does not lie in the little steeping ; as, from the extreme 

 whiteness and clearness, it was, beyond all doubt, most thoroughly 

 steeped and divested of the gummy substance ; while all agree, that 

 the drying before steeping can answer no good end. Were these two 

 notions to be insisted upon with the Natives, it would occasion such 

 delay, as would inevitably risk the greater part of the crop ; for if 

 it is not made and dried off-hand, it is sure to lose proportionably of 



its 



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