the drier and may be subjected to further operations which do not form part of the present invention such as being cut or trimmed to size or combined with other elements in the manufacture of a final product incorporating the mat as an element a forming screen of the type conventionally employed in the manufacture of wet laid fibrous products is a woven wire mesh screen which is sufficiently flexible to be trained about its guide rolls as is well known in the art the wires are spaced to allow water in a fibrous slurry fed to the screen to drain through the screen while retaining the fibers on the upper surface of the screen in accordance with the invention discrete areas of the screen are formed or treated so as to restrict drainage through those areas compared to the drainage through adjacent untreated areas as shown in fig2 the screen 14 contains areas 34 which are slower draining than the main body of the screen as noted above when a fibrous slurry stock is introduced to the moving screen or wire at a relatively slow rate compared to the speed of the wire the fibers become oriented in the machine direction and when.