Dr. Leavitt has devised a method of preparing hemp,which consists of a hemp brake of ingenious construction and great strength, propelled by a steam engine, breaking hemp at the rate of two pounds per minute, 1200 pounds in ten hours ; and delivering the hemp, in such condi tion as to be more easily and speedily heckled upon the common hand-heckle, than the dew-rotted hemp of the com mon hand-brake, and with quite as little, if not less waste. The cleaning appara tus is also thought to be likely to prove equally effective when furnished, as its simplicity and adaptation seem to war rant this conclusion. More than the whole of the fuel necessary for one steam engine, will be furnished, it is said, from the hemp itself, by three brakes, and is supplied to the furnace without neces sity of a fireman.
he hemp-brakes stand in a line over a strong grating, beneath which is o trough, whose sides, inclined inward, re ceive and deposit upon an endless band, running in the direction of the furnace, all the woody matter falling from the brakes and carrying it to a funnel, through which it is thrown into the furnace and scattered in its bed, igniting instantly, and keeping up an intensely hot fire. A man and two boys are sufficient to at tend each brake with ease, and a third one can bear off the hemp from the three brakes, delivered in bands or endless roving to be passed through the various subsequent machinery, a portion of which is designed to supersede the waste ful heckling now in use, avoiding the manufacture of tow entirely. Connected
with it is also to be an apparatus for sup plying the powerful antiseptic substances now in use in the manufactories of ship cordage and canvas in England, the effi cacy of which has been so severely tested in the Niger expedition, and on the west ern coast of South America, so celebrated for its production in the cordage and sails of shipping exposed to that climate. The material to be used will be made at the factory, and will not cost over $,5 for each ton of hemp.
Dr. Leavitt's efforts will prove of great value to our commercial interests, as weL as probably greatly encourage the agri culturists whose attention is devoted to the cultivation of hemp, and the amount of this product will doubtless be much increased at the west.
By a recent trial it appears that the strength of a rope of this unrotted was much greater than those of American water-rotted Russia or steam hemp.