38 



be packed into bundles for market. One man can extract some 81bs. 

 weight of fibre in a day of ten hours, and an English acre of land yields 

 about 9001bs. of fibre." 



Yield— It is estimated that each cutting gives 20,000 lbs. of green 

 stems with leaves, or 5,000 lbs. of dry stalks, as the yield per acre, 

 and the minimum product from the dry stalks is 15 per cent., that is 

 750 lbs. of raw merchantable fibre, or not quite 4 per cent, of the living 

 stem and leaves. In good soil and plenty of moisture, five crops may 

 be expected annually. The caution, however, must be given that until 

 the end of the first year at any rate when the roots have at length pen- 

 etrated the soil, a full crop can scarcely be expected. 



Properties of Ramie Fibre. 



In order to give some idea of the possibilities of this fibre in the fu- 

 ture, the following paragraphs on its properties and the uses to which 

 it may be put, are taken from a Report to the Secretary of State for 

 India in the year 1875 by Dr. J. Forbes Watson. 



There can be no doubt that ramie fibre is considerably stronger than 

 either flax or hemp. 



Ramie has also a high resisting power of another order. The resist- 

 ing power of fibres under the influence of moisture and various atmos- 

 pheric conditions, may be to some extent tested by the action of high- 

 pressure steam on them. The percentage loss of a specimen of Chinese 

 rhea amounted only to 89, and of Assam rhea to 1*51, whilst flax 

 lost 3*50 per cent., Italiam hemp 6*18, Russian hemp 8*44, and jute 

 even 21*39 per cent. 



Although strong and resisting, the fibres of the ramie are as fine, 

 if not finer, than those of flax, the mean diameter of the ultimate fibres 

 of flax is about 2060 °^ an mcn , of ramie (from Assam) about v»yVo> 

 and of China grass °^ an i ncn - Occasionally, however, samples 



of prepared ramie are met with in a state of even greater division, 

 either from a more complete disintegration, or perhaps even from the 

 greater original tenuity of the ultimate fibre. 



Whilst, therefore, as regards strength, resistance, and fineness, ramie 

 is either equal or superior to the best known fibres, it has the addi- 

 tional advantage of possessing in a considerable degree a silky lustre. 

 Jute, the only other fibre which can compete with it in this respect, is 

 far inferior to it in strength and durability, as well as in its capability 

 for bleaching and dyeing. 



Uses of Ramie Fibre. 



Ramie in virtue of its quality, has a wide range of affinity with other 

 fibres, though it is not perfectly similar to any of them. This explains 

 why its experimental applications cover such a wide field. It has been 

 actually tried as a substitute for cotton, hemp, flax, wool, and silk. 



Ramie with Cotton. — With regard to cotton, attention was directed 

 to it among other fibres during the years of the cotton famine pro- 

 duced by the American war. In 1862, Dickson prepared cottonised 

 ramie, and sometime afterwards, in France, Messrs. Mallard and Bon- 

 neaud, by cutting the fibre into lengths of two inches, and treating it 

 with alkalies and oil, produced from China grass a material suitable 

 for admixture with cotton. This cottonised ramie was the subject of 



