186 ENGLISH BOTANY. 



strangely in these days of steam as liis horror of the sea and his denunciation of the 

 " boldness and criminal perverseness" of man in navigating it, appears to the descendants 

 of the Vikings. He speaks of " flaxen nets being so fine as to pass through a ring, and 

 of one man carrying as many as would encompass a forest, threads being thinner than 

 a spider's web, yet strong as a lute-string ;" statements which we must allow partake 

 somewhat of Eastern hyperbole. Although the use of linen fabric was common to the 

 Romans, they appear rather to have preferred woollen garments, aud Alexander 

 Severus, the emperor, was the first Roman who wore a linen shirt. From the countries 

 of the Mediterranean the use of Flax spread throughout Europe. It has a remarkable 

 range of temperature, thriving from the fields of Northern Europe to the tropical plains 

 of India. This quality and the short summer really necessary to bring the plant to 

 perfection recommended its culture to northern nations. Mention of it occurs in the 

 Sagas of the ninth and tenth centuries, and its general use among the Norsemen at that 

 period is certain from passages in " Rigsmaal " and other poems ; moreover, we have 

 the record of a tax being levied on Flax at the beginning of the eleventh century. In 

 Enghind we have no proof of its cultivation before the Conquest, and it does not 

 appear in the list of taxed articles until 1175. In 1531 a law was passed to compel 

 one rood iu every sixty acres of arable land to be sown with Flax or Hemp ; and it 

 seems then to have been the custom for every farmer to sow a small quantity for the 

 use of his family ; fur Tusser says : — 



" Good Flax and good Hemp for to have of hir owne, 

 In Maie a good huswife wil see it be sowne; 

 And afterwanl trim it. to serve at a neede. 

 The fimble to sjiiu, and the karl for hir seede." 



The very exhausting nature of the crop has, however, always prevented its exten- 

 sive cultivation in England. This quality was well known to the ancients, and Pliny 

 asserts that it " scorches the ground." In many parts of the country clauses are still 

 inserted in the leases to prevent the farmer from growing Flax, though with the 

 present scientific mode of farming it may be done judiciously and without injury to 

 the soil. At a very early period the culture of Flax became of great importance to 

 the Irish, and the " Brehon laws," unwritten but delivered by tradition from one to 

 another, declared that every farmer should be legally obliged to acquire a full acquaint- 

 ance with the best mode of working and dressing it. It is curious to read passages in 

 old writers concerning the extensive use and manufacture of linen in Ireland in the 

 year 1.581. Edward Campion, the Jesuit, declares of the "nieere Irish" that "linen 

 shirts the rich do weare for wantoness and bravery with wide hanging sleeves playted;" 

 aud adds : " Thirtie yards are little enough for one of them." Spenser the poet, too, 

 declaring the inefficiency of the laws against the "wearing of Irish apparel," enumerates 

 amongst other enormities " the greate linen roll which the women weare to keep their 

 heads warm after cutting their haire." We learn that the queen of Charles VII. of 

 France, the contemporary of our Henry VI., i-ejoiced in the possession of two linen under- 

 garments, a supply which would be considered rather scanty in these times. Flax is 

 grown in large quantities in the alluvial soils of Lincolnshire and in the Eastern coun- 

 ties. In Ireland it flourishes extensively, and the manufacture of linen is one of the 

 chief resources of the country. Its cultivation requires care and a suitable soil to 

 secure a good crop. We learn from agricultural authorities that it succeeds best in 

 deep and friable loams, such as contain a large proportion of vegetable matter. Strong 

 clays do not answer well, nor such as are of a gravelly or sandy nature. There are 



