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the green fide undermost, and, if not heavy enough to keep the lint under water, some stones may be laid above them, but the flax fhould not be preffed to the bottom. If the flax was pulled in proper time, and that the water is warm and soft, the rind will probably be fufficiently loosened in seven or eight days; and if, on trial, it is found to be so, it ought immediately to be taken out. It is always fafer to give it too little, than too much watering; as the defect may be eafily remedied by giving it the longer time upon the ground; whereas a mistake on the other hand cannot be repaired. When fufficiently watered, it feels soft to the gripe, and the harle parts easily with the boon or show, which last is then become brittle, and looks whitifh. The coarfer the flax, the fooner it is watered. Each beet, when taken up, should be gently rinsed in the pond, to clean it of any mud or naftinefs.

If the flax is fpread on poor ley, it will improve it greatly; and the water in which it has been steeped is also a valuable manure, which fhould be carefully carried or conducted to fome ground that needs it; or weeds and ftraw &c. thrown in to absorb it and make dung. The flax fhould be spread thin and equally, and handled tenderly. If it meet with a few hours of dry weather after fpreading, it will be fo much the better, as it will make the barle firm to bear the rain.

The flax, after lying on the field till it is fufficiently blistered in the boon, and easily parts with it, should be taken up in a dry state; and, to give it the greater crispness, may have a little heating on a kiln, immediately before it is wrought; ufing for this purpose some charred coals, or any fuel that has little or no fmoke.

If at any time the flax fhall be allowed to ripen so far as to harden its bolls (as at prefent), which it ought not, they should be rippled off before it is put in the water; as they make a

rich and excellent food for cattle, mixed with boiled chaff, and should be carefully dried and preferved for that purpose.

Eftimate of the Expence and Profit of 1-4th Acre under Flax. Rent of ground prepared, usually the price of the feed,

Two pecks and three-fourths feed, at 5s. per peck,

Clodding and fowing,

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Produce of a raiddling crop 8 ftone of 24 lb. at 12s.

Profit,

Or (per acre),

For Cambric and Fine Lawn

0 16

L. 2 15

4 16 L. 2

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8 4

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The ground fhould be a rich, light, and dry foil, fufficiently pulverized by repeated ploughings when in a dry ftate, or after potatoes; and, if near a wood, it will fave trouble. The feed fhould be fown before the middle of April, about double the quantity ufually fown for flax or lint. The ground fhould be rolled, if dry, and weeded when it is three inches long; after which, forked sticks (about one 1-half inch thick) fhould be fet at four or five feet distance, poles laid along these forks, about fix or feven inches above the lint, and distant from each other two, three, or four feet, according to the length of the brufhwood that is to be laid over them. This brufhwood ought to be laid close and even, rifing all about eighteen or twenty inches.

The lint fhould be pulled as foon as the feed is formed,

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or a few days after it is out of the bloom, before the lint turn yellow. If any be coarfer than the reft, it should be kept separate. It must be pulled above the brushwood, and every handful laid upon it four or five hours to dry, if it is fine weather. Spread it out four or five days, putting it into a barn at night, and taking care that it get no rain, which" would make it turn black. If it get wet, it is better to leave it on the grafs till dry than to put it in wet. The bundles must be opened in the barn, or made very loose, to keep them from heating.

The pit for watering should be made long before it is ufed, and will be the better if it has a clean sward on the bottom ; if not, fome straw may be put under it. A small

rill of clean water should run in and off the lint while in it. The pit may be fix or feven feet broad, by three deep. Along the furface of the water, or a little lower on the two fides, run poles fixed down by wooden hooks of this figure, 7; and other poles across, with their ends under these, to keep all the lint down three or four inches under the furface of the water. The time of watering depends fo much on the weather, and on the foftnefs or hardness of the water, that no certain period can be fixed.

IT may be proper to obferve here that the introduction of the two-handed wheel, hardly known as yet in any part of this county, would contribute perhaps more than any thing to the speedy increafe of our flax crops. This fimple machine, now common in other parts of Scotland, would enable the fame number of hands to spin the double of what they do at prefent; fo that there would be a call for raising a double quantity, one half of which would fall to be added to our prefent exportation, and bring a large yearly revenue to the county, befides enabling the poor to earn twice as much by spinning as they do at present. A small premium to the

first, fecond, and third, who fhould use these wheels in any parish might have a good effect. After that we may perhaps, as in other places, go a ftep farther, and think of spinning lint in a still greater quantity by the ufe of water-machinery, which is now made to spin flax as well as wool and cotton.

Time of Sorving.

Beans and pease are fown after the middle of March; oats from the 20th or 25th of March to the middle of April; flax and potatoes in the end of April and beginning of May; bear from the ift to the 15th of May; clover and ryegrafs fometimes with the bear, and fometimes 8 or 10 days later; turnips in June..

*

Harvesting.

Hay is cut about the beginning or middle of July; flax is pulled about the beginning or middle of Auguft; bear begins to be cut down about the 15th of Auguft; oats about the 15th of September; beans and peafe are cut after the oats, about the beginning or towards the middle of October; and the potatoes are houfed commonly about the first week of November.

Produce.

The average produce is reckoned to be nearly 3 returns from oats, 5 1-half from beans and bear, and about from 10 to 12 from potatoes. Further particulars may be found under the different crops, and need not be repeated †.

SECT. V.-Crops not commonly cultivated.

WHEAT has been frequently tried, and found to answer

i. e. From fown graffes. Meadow hay is feldom cut before Auguft, as it is late of being faved.

The quantity of arable land on the continent of Argyleshire was fuppo

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well, particularly in deep loam and strong lands in the neighbourhood of Campbelton. The reasons alleged for not cultivating it commonly are, the want of enclosures, and the want of a flour mill. But these reasons will hardly be sustained, as there are in that part of the country a confiderable number of enclosures; and fome good fpring-wheat has been raised on fields entirely open; and if the grain fhould be raised to a fufficient quantity, it would always find a mill. A little addition to the machinery of the present mill would serve. The true reafon is, that the demand for bear to make whisky is greater than even that for bread to eat; and the distillers have a brisker trade and more ready cash than the bakers. The neglect of this crop is a confiderable loss to the farmas, in fuitable foil, and within reach of good manure, it is of all corn crops the most profitable. It is also a great loss to the county in general, as more than 3000l. is yearly fent out of it for flour, which might all be faved, if we would raife wheat of our own.

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What would favour much the cultivation of this grain in Kintyre is, that there is feldom any froft that would hurt it; fo that the climate, as well as the foil, encourages the growth of it.—John Turner, a farmer in the neighbourhood of Campbelton, fays that the crop of between eight and nine acres brought him one year above 1ool.; and the crop of four acres another year brought him 50l.

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