EUROPEAN FLAX.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 2068, 9 October 1880, Page 3

EUROPEAN FLAX.

The following letter appear* in this mornineo issue of Mie “ P ess ” :

TO THB EDITOH OF TUB PBBBB. j SlB, —Referring to some remarks made by you some little time ago when commenting on the prizes offered by the Local Industries Association, particularly that portion wherein you state that you have no data at hand whioh’would enable you to form an npproximate opinion of the quality of twine likely to ba required this coming harvest. I will, wit h your permission, lay before your readers a tew facts in emneclion with the subject. I have ascertained that there are likely to be at least 600 self-acting harvesters with twine attachments at work in our fields next harvest. The average work of a well handled machine is about 200 acres, although a much larger area has been secured by single machines last season. Experiments have shown that it takes 2ilbs of fi< o twice, and a little over .Jibs of coarse to tie an average crop, eay of thirty bushels. Six hundred machines cutting 200 acres each during the season would, therefore, use 133 tons of twine, and which, in round numbers at la per lb, the price our farmers will probably have to pay for it, means £l4 896, the great proportion of which will have to be sent out of the count ry, and that for a commodity which we have all the conditions present for producing ourselves. The great importance of th;o aspect of the flax industry may be estimated it wo reflect that there were ncco ding to the Government returns 657,700 cores under cereals last year. Probably this acreage will not diminish, if it does not increase, and it U reasonable to suppose that the great bulk of corn grown will in future be tied with twine so soon as suitable machines can be supplied, or until some other invention takes the fi-ld, such os the straw binder, now in embryo. Por the sake of arriving at something like an approximate idea of the value of tho twinemaking industry under the above very probable conditions, let us suppose that 300,000 acres are tied annually with twine. At the estimate given, viz, 2J'b. per sore, wo have tho enormoui quantity of 562 tons, which at 1s per lb. meats £62,944. 1 would ask. Are we going to alltho greater portion of this large aura to be annually drained out of the country for an article which leaves no return. The employment of such an amount of espital amongst ourselves would find remunerative employment for our -people, and of course promote the general prosperity of the country. Tho industry of crushing for oil would follow an a matter of course, opening up further channels for luora tivo investment. While yra had to tie our corn with wire we had no alternative but to send our money out of the country for the coveted article ; but the advent of the application of twine to tho same purpose places within easy reach of us tho supplying of ourselves with this material. We have a climate and soil second to none for the growth of flax of tho best qualify, capable of supplying with ease not only our own requirements for the harvest field, but those of the neighboring colonies. The high opinion which I hare