LINE^. (flax family.) 181 



beak — Spring — Fields and roadsides ; escaped from cultivation. 

 This plant furnislies the valuable fibre known as Jute, which is soft, 

 silky, and easily spun. It is used in the manufacture of carpets, and 

 some kinds of cloth, but is not suitable for cordage, owing to its 

 becoming soft in water. It is extensively used in surgery as a cheap 

 drainage material. 



2. C, triloeulari§, L. 0. .2 to .3, asperulous. Leaves short- 

 petioled, ovate to oblong, serrate, the lower teeth usually ciliate. Pe- 

 duncles 1-2-flowered ; pods scabrous, 3-4-angled, cylindrical, .05 long, 

 .002 broad, 3-valved, obtusely-beaked — Spring — Ghor-et-Safieh. 



DIVISION II. DISCIFLOR/E. 



Sepals sometimes distinct, imbricated or valvate, at others 

 united into a generally small calyx, with lobes or teeth imbri- 

 cated, open, or valvate, free from ovary, or adnate to the 

 base of the ovary only. Torus a fleshy, cup-shaped disk, free 

 or connecting the ovary with the calj^x, or united with the 

 ovary alone, or rarely disconnected with the ovary, and cov- 

 ering the base of the calyx. Petals generally as many as 

 sepals, or by abortion fewer, inserted on the torus, at the 

 base of the calyx, around the disk. Stamens as many as petals, 

 or doable their number, or by abortion fewer, inserted around, 

 or within, or above the disk. Gynoecium of united carpels, 

 divided by septa, with placenta at central angle of cells, or 

 with separate carpels, generally on the disk, sometimes im- 

 planted in it. 



Order XXIII. LINi:^. (Flax Family.) 



Herbs, sometimes with shrubby base, regular, symmet- 

 rical hypogynous flov^ers, 4:-^-merous throughout, iinbricated 

 calyx, and hypogynous convolute petals, the A-^ stamens con- 

 nate at base, and the capsule with twice as many incomplete 

 cells and seeds as there are styles — Styles 4-5. Ovules 

 anatropous. Capsule loculicidal. Partition projecting from 

 valve. Albumen scanty. 



1. RADIOL. A, L. Radiola. 



Flowers tetramerous throughout. Capsule 4-celled — A trivial 

 annual herb, with aspect of Alsine, with filiform forked branches, and 

 minute, corymbose, white flowers. 



R. linoides, Gmel. .02 to .1, glabrous. Leaves ovate, .002 

 long — September — Plateau between Jebel Sunnin and Jebel Keniseh. 



2. L.I]^U]n[, L. Flax. Kittdn. Zir. Fdrq. 



Flowers pentamerous. Capsule 5-celled, cells divided by parti- 

 tions from the valve almost to the axis — Herbs or shrubs. 



