200 CULTIVATED VEGETABLES. 



flax which Pliny calls Byssus, and from which 

 a kind of lawn or tiffany was made. The 

 same author says, a flax is now found out 

 which will not consume in the fire ; this he 

 calls living flax, and says, he saw at a great 

 feast, all the table-cloths, napkins, and 

 towels, thrown into the fire, which received 

 a cleanness and lustre from the flames, which 

 no water could have given it. This kind of 

 cloth was used at the royal obsequies and 

 funerals, to wrap round the corpse as a 

 shroud or sheet, in order to preserve the 

 ashes of the body from mixing with those of 

 the wood of the funeral pile. Pliny adds, 

 that this flax grew in the deserts of India, 

 where the country is parched and burnt with 

 the sun : he says, it is difficult to be found, 

 and as hard to be woven, being in short fibres. 

 In its natural state, the colour was reddish, 

 but by burning it became bright : it was 

 esteemed as precious as oriental pearls. It 

 does not appear by this account, that the 

 Romans were acquainted with its being a 

 mineral substance. 



The art of making this fossil linen is nearly 

 lost, although John Baptist Porta, the inven- 

 tor of the camera-obscura, assures us, that in 

 his time (from 1445 to 1515) the spinning of 



