52 
treatment. The first crop of green stems, ready for mechanical 
treatment, can be gathered about eight months after planting the 
roots ; the crops then follow in quick succession, the interval between- 
the crops being about eight weeks. It is estimated that in a well- 
regulated plantation under proper conditions i£ tons of a clean; 
quality of fibre may be obtained annually from each acre of land. 
Ramie possesses such remarkable and exceptional qualities that it 
is considered a first-class textile. Its staple is long. It is supple, and 
has a silky gloss. It does not rot, which alone is a matter of great 
importance. It has highly absorptive properties, and has proved 
itself stronger than flax, hemp, jute, cotton, and such like, while as 
regards price it could to-day be produced and brought to market to 
compete advantageously with flax, hemp, and cotton. 
Ramie is employed in a great variety of textiles, such as domestic 
napery, damask, ladies’ dress goods, underclothing, lace, upholstery 
goods, fishing nets, sailcloths, driving belts, canvas, ropes, twine, 
surgical bandages, lint, and incandescent gas mantles. 
Owing partly to the drawback that, until comparatively recently, 
effective machinery was not available for the proper extraction of the 
fibre, the practice, up to a few years ago, was to use hand cleaned 
China Ramie, or to ship to Europe for treatment dried Ramie canes, 
or crude bark with the pellicle still adhering. This latter course has 
always proved a fatal error, and has formed the overwhelming difficulty 
in the manufacture of Ramie in Europe, as under the most careful 
handling imaginable the canes and crude ribbons must, and do, arrive 
in a dry, brittle, and mutilated condition, with the gum necessarily so 
hardened that the natural difficulties attending the decortication, 
degumming, and combing processes are immensely increased; the 
result to the manufacturer — apart from the money absolutely wasted 
on the freight of merely useless refuse in the shape of cane wood, etc. — 
being a less valuable fibre at an unnecessarily high price. 
With the gradual accumulation of experience the difficulties in the 
preparation of the fibre have been overcome. Important factors in the 
obtaining of this have been the introduction of the improved Decorti- 
cating Machine invented by Pierre Paulin Faure, of Limoges, and the 
additional process of cleaning and opening the fibre. With these 
machines the canes are treated at the plantation while still in a green 
state. Before fermentation and subsequent hardening of the gum set 
in, the gum is eliminated mechanically from the decorticated fibre, 
with the result that a soft fibre of good length and colour can be 
produced at a moderate cost. In this way only can the best results be 
obtained. In China, where the fibre is still extracted by hand labour, 
one Chinaman and his family can turn out only 4 to 5 lbs. of dry fibre 
per day of ten hours, whereas one Faure machine of the latest pattern 
can produce 800 lbs. of dry fibre per day of twenty-four hours— working 
three shifts of eight hours each— or, say, 100 tons per machine per 
annum. 
