On the Cultivation of Flax. 



391 



land for twenty years, the produce is unusually small, and the 

 yield of fibre is only an eighth, whereas it is "generally a fifih, 

 of the weight of dried flax straw. The general yield per acre 

 averages in common years 40 stones, whereas this has only given 

 26 stones. 



The analysis of Sir Robert Kane has reference to plants which 

 have not perfected their seed. But as the seed is ripened to a 

 certain extent before the flax is pulled, its analysis must be taken 

 into account in estimating the matters which the crop abstracts 

 from the soil. It is given as follows : — 



Ashes Phosphoric Acid Nitrogen 



per cent. per cent. j per cent. 



Capsules, with seed, contained 8-80 . . 0-39 . . 1-80 



Husks of the capsules . , . 6-54 . . 0-38 . . 1-50 



Seeds 5-18 . . 0-47 . . 1-81 



It will be thus seen that the husks contain a considerable pro- 

 portion of useful matters available for food, and that they may be 

 used advantageously along with the seed. 



Notwithstanding the great value of flax-seed used as food for all 

 the domestic animals, and its use in Great Britain in very large 

 quantities, either in the simple state or when made into oil-cake^ 

 it is only very lately that flax-growers in these countries have 

 saved it, the old wasteful system being to steep the plant with the 

 seed on the stalks, under the impression that its separation would 

 impair the quality of the fibre. As the seed has always been 

 saved in Belgium and Holland from the very finest kinds of flax, 

 it is astonishing that this ridiculous idea was not sooner exploded 

 here. 



It must always be a great object with the farmer to render a 

 large proportion of his straw and inferior grain available as food 

 for animals, to be consumed on the farm ; a portion of the nutri- 

 ment they contain being thus applied to the support of the cattle, 

 and the remainder being again returned to the land in the form of 

 manure, enriching it, and preparing it for the production of 

 other crops. Under ordinary circumstances this is not always 

 practicable to any considerable extent, and the great mass of straw 

 is merely fitted for manure by the fold-yard system, which is con- 

 fessedly wasteful of many valuable products of its partial decom- 

 position with the manure and urine, which are evaporated and lost. 

 But if a highly nutritive food, in small bounds, can be added to 

 these bulky matters, a large quantity can be consumed by the 

 animals, with much profit to the farmer, the mixture being equally 

 palatable to them and advantageous to him. House-feeding 

 cattle enables the greatest number of animals to be maintained at 

 the least expense, but, on inferior soils, the food is not sufficiently 

 nutritive to empower the farmer to adopt this system. The pur- 



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