"When the plants are fit to gather, their leaves fall off, their stems begin to turn yellow, and the seed- pods to become brown. Men, women, and children are then sent into the fields to uproot the plants by hand. They are all pulled up separately, carefully dried in the sun, and then laid in order, crossing each other, with the root ends pointing one way.
"A great deal needs to be done to the flax before it is fit for the manufacturer. First of all, the seed- pods have to be removed from the stalks. This is done by a process called rippling. Men called ripplers sit in front of a coarse, iron comb fixedwith its teeth uppermost. This is the ripple. The men draw the stalks one by one through the teeth, and so separate the seed-pods from them.
"The next process is known as rotting or retting.
The object of it is to separate the bast fibers from the woody part of the stem. To do this the stalks are steeped, root downwards, in a shallow pool for about ten or twelve days.
