FLAX. 67 



deemed her totally unfit to become a communicant. He con- 

 veyed tliis to her as kindly as he could, and she replied, 

 " Aweel, Sir, aweel ; but I ken ae thing as the Lintbell opens 

 to the sun, so does my heart to the Lord Jesus ! " Here was 

 seed of the Lord's own planting ; no hireling had cultivated 

 this ground, or scattered into it the germs of life, but the 

 Second Adam had been busy in this garden, dressing it and 

 keeping it. 



The Perennial Flax is the handsomest and most scarce 

 member of the family. It was gathered on Leyburn Shawl, 

 an extensive table-land overlooking the rich valley of Wens- 

 leydale, in Yorkshire. It commands a view of Bolton Castle, 

 where the unfortunate Mary Stuart was imprisoned. She suc- 

 ceeded once in effecting an escape, but her flight was soon 

 discovered, and she was recaptured on Leyburn Shawl. This 

 plant, with its lovely but evanescent flowers, is a fit memento 

 of that beautiful and frail woman. 



The Small Cathartic Flax (Linum catharticum), is very dif- 

 ferent from its brethren ; its petals are snow-white, its leaves 

 grow opposite one another, and the flowers droop. It often 

 mingles with the herbage in meadows, but, having biting 

 qualities, I dare say the cattle would as soon be without it. 



The Little Flax-seed (Eadiola millegrana), is the smallest of 

 our flowering plants. Fanny found a number of the plants on 

 the right bank of the Loe Pool, a small lake near Helstone, 

 in Cornwall, only separated from the sea by a bar of sand. 

 There is an interesting description of it in Mr. Johns' " Week 

 at the Lizard," which you must read some evening when you 

 have leisure. Fanny determined to visit the Loe Pool because 

 of the plants which he described as growing around it, and 

 she persuaded her mother to stay at the snug "Angel" inn, at 

 Helstone, for that purpose. The number of plants she got 

 fully rewarded her for all her efforts, and this tiny Flax-seed 

 was one. The tiny flowers have four sepals, four greenish- 

 white petals, four stamens, and two stigmas. 



