sulphite stock, competition would be strongest from the eastern mills;
in fact, the hurd stock might very possibly meet with favor as a
book-stock furnish in the Michigan and Wisconsin paper mills, which are
within the sulphite fiber-producing region. Because of its very close
proximity to paper mills, this latter possibility applies with far
greater force to the Wisconsin hemp region, where a considerable
extension of the hemp industry is anticipated.


[Illustration: FIG. 3.--A representative sample of hemp hurds, natural
size, showing hemp fiber and pieces of wood tissue.]


=CHARACTER OF THE MATERIAL.=

As received from Pierceton, Ind., the hurds consisted of a mixture of
tangled hemp bast fibers and pieces of broken wood of the hemp stalk.
(Fig. 3.) No reliable data were secured as to the proportion of bast
fiber in the total shipment of 4 tons, although two hand separations of
small representative samples gave results averaging 8 per cent. The
chemical character of the material was such and the quantity was so
small that any appreciable variation of the proportion should not affect
materially the treating processes finally adopted, yet its presence in
varying proportions undoubtedly would modify to some extent the quality
of the resulting paper product. Since the length of the ultimate bast
fiber averages about 22 mm. and the length of the ultimate hemp wood
fiber averages 0.7 mm., it is natural to assume that the bast fiber
would tend to increase the strength of paper produced from the hurds.
(Fig. 4.)