In the domestic manufactures the flax is broken or scutched at home, when the weather prevents out door work. The common brake consists of four wooden swords fixed in a frame, and another frame with three swords, which play in the interstices of the first by means of a joint at one end. The flax is taken in the left hand, and placed between the two frames, and the upper frame is pushed down briskly upon it. It breaks the flax in four places, and by moving the lef the right, the whole handful is soon broken upright in a block of wood so as to stand steady, in which is a horizontal slit about three feet from the ground, the edge of which is thin. The broken flax held in handfuls in the left hand is inserted in this slit, so as to project to the right and a flat wooden sword of a peculiar shape is held in the right hand ; with this the flax is repeatedly struck close to the upright board, while the part which lies in the slit is continually changed by a motion of the left hand. This operation beats off all the pieces of the wood which still adhere to the fibre, without breaking it, and after a short time the flax is cleared of it and fit to be heckled. On a larger scale the breaking, scutching, and, and subsequent heckling, are effected by more efficient machines.
Flax is found in every quarter of the globe, and has been cultivated for its fibrous stalk from the very earliest period of which we have any record. England has never grown a sufficient quantity of flax for its own use, although it has been attempted to give encou ragement to the cultivation by public rewards or bounties. A considerable quantity of land is now sown with flax seed every year in Somersetshire, Lancashire, and Yorkshire : it is largely grown in Scotland, and still more so in Ireland.
There has perhaps neverbeen a period when the flax culture and manufacture occupied a larger share of public attention than at pre sent. Many circumstances have combined to bring about this state of things. We will briefly glance at the chief aspects which the subject presents.
Cotton forms a larger item of our textile manufactures than all other fibrous materials combined: and the United States supply an overwhelming proportion of the cotton which we work up. We imported 775 million lbs. of cotton in 1819, of which four-fifths were brought from the United States. Hence our manufactures are almost wholly at the mercy of any fluctuations of crop which may occur in America ; for the market-price depends chiefly in the abundance or scarcity of the United States supply.
If therefore we could increase the quantity of any fibrous material capable of being grown in our own country, and use it as a partial substitute for cotton, it would give our manu factures greater independence of America.
Besides this, Great Britain and Ireland would be benefited if a good sale were commanded for home grown flax. Ireland and the High t lands of Scotland since the failure of the potato crops, and England since the repeal of the Corn Laws, have been in a position to , seize eagerly on any new culture which pro f raises moderate success ; and landowners in , all three countries are at the present time encouraging their tenants to direct attention to the flax culture.
Mr. G. R. Porter, in an able paper read at the Edinburgh Meeting of the British Asso ciation in 1850, said—' Hitherto we have in this country been greatly dependent upon our foreign importation for supplies of flax. ' While the law imposed restrictions upon the importation of grain for human food, there ex isted a kind of impediment in the way of increasing our home growth of articles for any purpose not of equal primary necessity. That impediment is now removed ; and there can be no reason given why our fields should not be henceforth used for the production of any article that promises an adequate profit to the farmer.' These words have had consi derable effect in urging agriculturists to attend to this matter.
It is admitted that much has yet to be learned before the English and Irish farmers will equal those of Belgium in the flax culture. Great care must be shown in selecting the seed ; and Sir Robert Kand has lately shevrn how, by applying the steep-water to purposes of manure, and the woody or stalky refuse to purposes of fuel, greater profit may be realized than heretofore. It is not only the flax fibre which we largely import, but flax-seed for sowing, flax seed for making linseed oil, and flax oil-cake for feeding our cattle. In addition to many minor improvements recently sug gested, Mr. Donlan has introduced a mode of pickling or chemically preparing the seed before sowing ; which (unless the accounts are greatly exaggerated) seems to be a very important improvement.
But improvements in culture are not the only object of attention ; improvements in manufacture are equally undergoing enquiry. The reader will have observed, in the earlier paragraphs of this article, that whatever the mode of steeping may be, cold water is always employed. Now it has occurred to Mr. Schenk that if hot water were substituted, the process might be expedited. The method has been tried by the Royal Flax Society of Belfast, who placed the flax in long troughs, filled the troughs with cold water, and heated the water by steam. The experiments tried seem to bear out the assertion that the process is not only more quickly conducted by the new method than by the old, but that more flax fibre can be obtained from a given weight offlax plant.