262 THE FLAX CROP. 



stations ; individual members, however, are found in India, 

 New Zealand, Australia, and other countries. Its native 

 country appears still to be a matter of question among 

 botanists, as it is found growing wild in most countries 

 where the physical conditions of soil and climate are 

 suited to its growth. The general opinion, however, 

 inclines towards ascribing it to the East, where, with the 

 principal cereal plants furnishing food to man, it was 

 known and cultivated from the earliest periods of our 

 history. Be its original country in the East, or where it 

 may, the natural disposition, to suit itself to such a vast 

 range of soils and climates as those in which it is now to 

 be met with, is of infinite importance to man, as it enables 

 him to avail himself of the advantages resulting from its 

 cultivation to a far greater extent than he otherwise 

 would be able to do. 



The members of this order generally are remarkable for 

 the tenacity of their fibres, the elegance of their shapes, the 

 beauty of their flowers which are blue, red, or white * 

 and the emollient and demulcent properties of their seeds. 

 All are harmless; some few possess a slight medicinal 

 action ; in others even this is absent. Of these we may 

 instance the Linum catharticum, a very common weed 

 of our poor soils, whose leaves contain properties of a 

 purgative character, and the L. selaginoides, which is 

 accounted in South America of great use both as a mild 

 aperient and as a tonic. Probably these properties per- 

 vade the whole order, but have not been remarked in the 

 common flax. Several of its members are plentifully met 

 with in this country as weeds. The L. catharticum, 



1 M. Brogniart considers that white varieties often exhibit a marked dif- 

 ference in the colouring of the leaves, and suggests that a modification may 

 also exist in the tissues of the stems. M. Louis Vilmorin (since dead) is 

 at present experimenting upon the cultivation of white varieties of flax. So 

 far he considers the fibre to be of inferior and coarser quality. Annales de 

 VAgric. Frangaise, Fevrier, 1853. 



