The Sun.
London, England, 1863-01-23 00:00:00

IRELAND'S LINEN TRADE.

The progress made in the staple industry of this province
during the last six months has been no less remarkable than
gratifying. While the farming interest has suffered to an
extent that has almost prostrated the cultivators of small
holdings, and while the lamentable decrease of employment
in the cotton manufacture has brought numbers of the in-
dustrious ranks to the verge of starvation, beneficial activity
has reigned in every department of the linen trade. Mill-
owners have kept their hands well employed, and makers
of goods have pushec on production with all possible
energy. In the comp iratirely new section of the manu-
tacture—weaving by steam power—there has been steady
increase. Ten years ago there were only 60 power-looms
connected with the Irish linen trade. At the commence-
ment of 1857 there were about 2,000, and so rapid has been
the progress of the last six years that at present Ireland
owns between 5,000 and 6,000 steam looms. In Lisburn
and its neighbourhood, where such distress prevails in the
wretched homes of the cotton operatives, the people engaged
at the flax-spinning mills, and those working at the thread
manufacture, enjoy comparative comfort. Any skilled hand
can earn, by 10 hours a day labour, fully twice the average
wages realised by the cotton weavers, who labour from 13
to 16 hours a day. Irrespective of the large numbers of
persons engaged at the extensive bleach-works of Messrs.
J. N. Richardson, Sons, and 0 wden, at Glenmore, and the
immense employment given to worapeople at the large con-
cern of Messrs. Richardson, of Lambeg, upwards of 2,000
hands are employed at the works at Hilden, the Island and
the Lisburn Mills. Besides these concerns, the damask
manufacture, of which that town is thy; original seat, forms
a very important source of local employment. It is about
a century since the art of weaving designs on textile fabrics
was introduced at Lisburn by Air. William Coulson, and
from that date the artistic skill of the operatives gradually
progressed. The present proprietor of the larger manufac-
tory, and the only direct representative of the original
house, gives employment to a great many work-
people, some of whom, we understand, are able to min
20s. to 255. a week. Mr. Coulson has recently had very
extensive orders for the supplying of her Majesty's navy,
not only with damask table linen, but also with plain and
twilled sheetings. At present a large order for her Majesty
the Queen gives employment to the most scientific of the
operatives engaged at that manufactory. Captain Ward,
who succeeded to the concern of the late Jas. Coulson and
Co.—a junior branch of the alderman— has been very ac-
tively engaged in the trade for years past, and, as we learn,
has now on hand an extensive order for the household of
his Royal Highness the Prince of Wales. We are not
able to state the exact number of hands to which these two
dainask manufacturing concerns give employment, but it is
very satisfactory to learn that the wages earned ;by
steady
.and skilled workers at the damask loom are
higher than those which their fathers were able to make
30 or 40 years ago. In the meantime the prices paid for
weaving . muslins and other cotton goods have fallen 75
per cent. in most cases. Taking, then, the neighbouring
town of Lisburn as an illustration of what the several
branches of the linen trade have been doing for the masses
of the people during the extreme pressure felt in
other sections of industry for some time past, a pretty
cortect idea may be formed of its growing importance as a
national manufacture. Nor is the present prosperity of the
linen trade transient or temporary. France, relaxing the I
protective code which formed a portion of the policy of the
First Napoleon, is gradually opening its eyes to the value of
unrestricted commerce. Austria, and even Italy, with all its
political perplexities, are moving and stirring into industrial
country.lFcesaeirei skill in gociyntned. .
failald
hnoi Ateditgloocol
rnutott
hslhewtel
oeulrsftroeheenfioii
continental
iei
neefic;
aelaa
riaxrt
for, even
ones
:1
vdoi
countries
neoint
irmtt
wterteleirerae:rcnse:ade
aon:t
Ireland's
ci f
ieTls
feapfahxai
maner,
deeeaerasrfnsgoercaroewenfqmt
peasant
,uehienrol
would
s
be ample room for an import of. 100,000 tons from foreign
sources. 'Supposing that the area noted should be sown, as
the cost of labour alone where the crop is cultivated on the
best system averages about £5 an acre, the total amount of
money circulated among the peasant population would
amount to no less a sum than one million
Northern Whig.

able Weather,—The sudden fickleness of this climate
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[AnvEßTlSEMNT.]
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' a day over
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quires to
marked
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..
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in all the symptoms of disease, and quickly
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This soothing
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