A specimen of cloth made from banana fibre, recently exhibited at the fair at Chnogking, hax been sent by the British Consal of that place to th Board of Trade, says. " Knowledg it is prepared in China by no rolling the stalks of the banana when about " year old, and steaming them over boiling water until quite soft. The green oater skin may now easily be stripped off by the stalks through a machine provided with two blast scrap ere, the reside then containing the fibres. The material is next wrapped ins cloth and hammered so as to separate the fibres and expel the moisture, and the fibres are then palled apart and spun into threads for weaving. The method of separation is thas very similar to that used in the preparation of ramie fibres. So far only a few lengths of cloth have been woven, and the price is therefore
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.