Is there any doubt that Flax-straw may be profitably grown in the United States for $15 or even $10 per tun? Consider that Flax has been extensively grown for years, even in our own State, for the seed only, the straw being thrown out to rot and being a positive nuisance to the grower. Now the seed is morally certain to command, for two or three years at least, a higher price than hitherto, because of the increased growth and extended use of the fiber. Let no farmer who has Flax growing be tempted to sell the seed by contract or otherwise for the present; let none be given over to the tender mercies of oil-mills. We shall need all that is grown this year for sowing next Spring, and it is morally certain to bear a high price even this Fall. The sagacious should caution their less watchful neighbors on this point. I shall be disappointed if a bushel of Flax-seed be not worth two bushels of Wheat in most parts of our Country next May.
Our ensuing Agricultural Fairs, State and local, should be improved for the diffusion of knowledge and the attainment of concert and mutual understanding with regard to the Flax-Culture. For the present, at any rate, few farmers can afford or will choose to incur the expense of the heavy machinery required to break and roughly dress their flax, so as to divest it of four-fifths of its bulk and leave the fiber in a state for easy transportation to the central points at which Flax-Cotton machinery may be put in operation. If the Flax-straw has to be hauled fifty or sixty miles over country roads to find a purchaser or breaking-machine, the cost of such transportation will nearly eat up the proceeds. If the farmers of any township can be assured beforehand that suitable machinery will next Summer be put up within a few miles of them, and a market there created for their Flax, its growth will be greatly extended. And if intelligent, energetic, responsible men will now turn their thoughts toward the procuring and setting up of the best Flax-breaking machinery (not for fully dressing but merely for separating the fibre from the bulk of the woody substance it incloses) they may proceed to make contracts with their neighboring farmers for Flax-straw to be delivered in the Autumn of next year on terms highly advantageous to both parties. The Flax thus roughly dressed may be transported even a hundred miles to market at a moderate cost, and there can be no reasonable doubt of its commanding a good price. M. Claussen assures me that he could now buy and profitably use almost any quantity of such Flax if it were to be had. The only reason (he says) why there are not now any number of spindles and looms running on Flax-Cotton is the want of the raw material. (His patent is hardly yet three mouths old.) Taking dressed and hetcheled Flax, worth seven to nine cents per pound, and transforming it into Flax-Cotton while Cotton is no higher than at present, would not pay.
Of course, there will be disappointments, mistakes, unforeseen difficulties, disasters, in Flax-growing and the consequent fabrications hereafter as heretofore. I do not presume that every man who now rushes into Flax will make his fortune; I presume many will incur losses. I counsel and urge the fullest inquiry, the most careful calculations, preliminary to any decisive action. But that such inquiry will lead to very extensive Flax-sowing next year,—to the erection of Flax-breaking machinery at a thousand points where none such have ever yet existed—and ultimately to the firm establishment of new and most important branches of industry, I cannot doubt. Our own country is better situated than any other to take the lead in the Flax-business; her abundance of cheap, fertile soil and of cheap seed, the intelligence of her producers, the general diffusion of water or steam power, and our present superiority in Flax-breaking machinery, all point to this result. It will be unfortunate alike for our credit and our prosperity if we indolently or heedlessly suffer other nations to take the lead in it.
P. S.—M. Claussen has also a Circular Loom in the Exhibition, wherein Bagging, Hosiery, &c., may be woven without a seam or anything like one. This loom may be operated by a very light hand-power (of course, steam or water is cheaper), and it does its work rapidly and faultlessly. I mention this only as proof of his inventive genius, and to corroborate the favorable impression he made on me. I have seen nothing more ingenious in the immense department devoted to British Machinery than this loom.
I understand that overtures have been made to M. Claussen for the purchase of his American patent, but as yet without definite result. This, however, is not material. Whether the patent is sold or held, there will next year be parties ready to buy roughly dressed Flax to work up under it, and it is preparation to grow such Flax that I am urging. I believe nothing more important or more auspicious to our Farming Interest has occurred for years than this discovery by M. Claussen. He made it in Brazil, while engaged in the growth of Cotton. It will not supersede Cotton, but it will render it no longer indispensable by providing a substitute equally cheap, equally serviceable, and which may be grown almost everywhere. This cannot be realized too soon.