§ MR. HOWORTH (Salford, S.)asked the President of the Board of Trade, If the item of 4,599,700 yards of flannel, shown in the Board of Trade Returns for March of this year, page 66, and exhibiting a very large increase in the export of that material over the corresponding quarter of last year, is limited to woollen flannels, or includes "flannelets" and other similar textiles made from cotton?
§ THE PRESIDENT (Sir MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH) (Bristol, W.)The Customs Department have informed me that the item flannels in the Returns does not include flannelets or other similar textiles made from cotton. If flannelets, or other similar textiles, are so described on the export documents, they are registered as cottons. The cause of the increase in the item of flannels in the quarter ended 31st March, 1888, as compared with the corresponding quarter of last year, is that during the quarter ended 31st March last "woollen shirtings mixed" were exported very largely to Australasia and the United States, and that such goods are registered as "flannels."