Sept. 1895.] FLAX FARMING ON THE CONTINENT. 



137 



Little or no attention is paid by the Russian flax farmer to 

 the grading of his produce, he sells it indiscriminately to the 

 small dealers or middlemen, who again dispose of it to the 

 merchants or exporters by whom it is assorted. It seems that 

 more than a hundred different marks or varieties of flax are 

 recognized in the Russian trade, although only a few exhibit 

 any remarkable difference of quality, as it frequently happens 

 that the mark merely indicates the locality where the fibre was 

 grown. 



Large quantities of Russian flax are garown for seed, but in 

 general the importance of the flax seed is only 35 to 40 per cent, 

 of, that of the fibre. It has been estimated that the annual 

 average production of flax fibre in Russia is about 5,625,000 

 cwts. The exports of flax seed, flax fibre, and of flax tow or 

 codilla from Russian ports since 1890 are shown below : — 









Flax Tow 



Year. 



Flax Seed. 



Flax Fibre. 



or 









Codilla. 





Cwts. 



Cwts. 



Cwts. 



1890 - - . - - 



7,797,857 



3,898,607 



378,000 



1891 ----- 



5,341,500 



3,642,428 



442,607 



1892 ----- 



3,830,786 



3,872,571 



439,071 



1893 ----- 



4,158,964 



3,942,643 



428,464 



1894- - - 



4,700,250 



2,829,857 



430,714 



Plemish flax, which is grown in western Belgium, has the 

 reputation of being the finest flax produced in Europe. Its 

 superiority is generally attributed to the peculiar properties it 

 acquires by being retted in the waters of the River Lys, which 

 flows through the town of Courtrai, the chief centre of the 

 Belgian flax industry. Flax is also cultivated in other parts of 

 Belgium, considerable quantities of a blue variety being grown 

 in Brabant. Belgian flax growers pay great attention to the 

 selection of the seed. The usual practice is to import fresh 

 seed annually from Russia or Holland. In some districts, how- 

 ever, imported seed is planted in the first year, and the seed 

 obtained from this crop is planted the second year, while for 

 the third year fresh imported seed is again used. The system 

 of cropping on the fiax farms varies in different districts, a 

 common rotation appears to be clover, oats, rye, wheat, but the 

 Belgian rotation is frequently given as flax following wheat or 

 oats after potatoes, mangold, or beet. An interval of eight 

 years is generally allowed between two crops of flax on the 

 same soil. In order to obtain a fine tough fibre the flax is 

 pulled before it is fully ripe. The average yield of fibre per 

 acre in Belgium is about 4 cwts. 



In the Courtrai district, the retting is done in crates anchored 

 in the running waters of the Lys. Dew-retting is practised in 

 Brabant, while in eastern Belgium pit-retting is largely em- 



