EXTRACTS—RURAL AFFAIRS. 375 
RURAL AFFAIRS. 
New Zealand Flax, (Phormium tenax.)—Extensively diffused as this valu¬ 
able plant is over the surface of New Zealand, it is along its western coast that 
the greatest quantities have been found. The preparation of the Flax for native 
use, or for exchange with Europeans, is effected by the native women, and their 
method of separating the silky fibre, from the long Flag-like leaf of the plant, 
of which it forms the under surface, appears to be quite simple. Holding the 
top of a recently cut leaf between their toes, they make a transverse section 
through the succulent matter at that end with a shell. Then by inserting it be¬ 
tween that substance and the fibre, they readily effect its separation by drawing 
the shell through the whole length of the leaf. Simple as appears this mode of 
separating the flax from the leaf by a shell in the hands of those savages, the 
European has not succeeded in his endeavoui’s to prepare the fibre'for himself, 
either by that, or by any other means which have been tried. Nor has any in¬ 
strument or piece of Machinery yet been invented, to enable him to strip off and 
prepare this valuable filament for the English market. The flax thus obtained 
from the natives, by the merchants of Sydney, undergoes no heckling, cleaning, 
or other preparation previous to its being shipped for the English market, but is 
merely made into bales, by being put in a press and screwed down. At the pe¬ 
riod when the trade with this noble race of savages was first opened by persons 
of courage and enterprize at Port Jackson, axes, knives, and other edge-tools, 
together with beads and similar ornaments, were received by them with avidity; 
but now, they will hardly take any thing in exchange except arms and ammuni¬ 
tion. Although most of the Chiefs can muster a larger force^ armed with mus¬ 
kets, their avidity to add to their armoury has undergone no diminution : and 
with the exception of blankets, red woollen shirts, and other warm clothing, to¬ 
bacco, and sugar, scarcely any article of English manufacture or merchandise 
has, as yet, proved an attraction to them. According to the statistical returns 
of New South Wales, for the year 1828, New Zealand Flax, to the extent of 60 
tons, and valued at £2,600, was exported from Sydney to England during that 
year; whilst during 1830, the quantity imported into Sydney for the English 
market was eight hundred and forty-one tons, and in 1831, one thousand and 
sixty-two tons. Its present price in London, may be stated at from £15 to £25 
per ton, depending much on its quality, and the clear manner in which it is 
brought into the market. From the experiments of M. Labillardiere, the strength 
of the fibre of this plant, as compared with that of the Agave Americana, flax, 
hemp, and silk, is as follows :—the fibre of the Agave breaks under a weight of 
seven; flax of eleven and three quarters; hemp of sixteen and three quarters; 
phormium of twenty-three seven-elevenths; and silk of twenty-four. Thus it 
appears that of all vegetable fibres, that of phormium is the strongest; and, ac¬ 
cording to the French authors, of a brilliant whiteness which gives it the appear¬ 
ance of satin. Hence the clothes made of it do not require bleaching, which so 
materially injures the quality of both hemp and flax. 
The Turnip-Fly, Altica .—The turnip-fly is not always of one kind, but the 
difference in them is not very important, for they only alter in their paint, their 
build is always alike. The most common is bottle-green, but in some fields all 
are painted black, with a white line on each side from stern to stern down the 
deck. They are so active, that the only way in which I could ever obtain them, 
