432 



But again, it may be asked, would it be good policy to 

 promote the growth of flax in England, and would it not 

 exhaust and deteriorate the land ? In the first place, I 

 conceive that there can scarcely a doubt arise as to the 

 benefit to be derived from the production at home of the 

 raw material of any extensive national manufacture, if it 

 can be grown as cheap, or cheaper, and of as good quality, 

 as that which is imported, particularly when the most con- 

 siderable item in the cost consists of labour. And as to 

 the fear of flax being an exhausting crop, I believe I may 

 affirm that both theory and practice totally discountenance 

 the idea, when its cultivation is conducted upon proper 

 principles. But then, again, the objector may urge that 

 the raising of food for man and animals is the natural use 

 to which the soil of England should be applied, particularly 

 as our annual consumption increases in so great a ratio. 

 At first view there seems to be some cogency in the argu- 

 ment ; but I contend that as, or if, we must import either 

 food or flax, it would be the best policy to encourage the 

 growth at home of that which will yield the greater amount 

 of profit, and the greater means of employment ; both of 

 which conditions, I imagine, will eminently be fulfilled by 

 the production of the latter. In Belgium, flax is called 



The golden crop," and " The rent-paying crop," and is 

 notoriously the most profitable in the system of rotation 

 which is there adopted. 



With regard to the latter consideration, — as to the ex- 

 hausting nature of a crop of flax, — I shall institute an 

 inquiry into its deteriorating influence, as compared with 

 one of wheat, first premising that it is generally maintained 

 by agricultural chemists, that a crop may be pronounced 

 exhausting in proportion to the amount of inorganic matter 

 which it abstracts from the soil. Now, I will suppose that 

 in these two instances, the grain in the case of wheat is sold 



