THE TEAZLE CROP. 



CROPS grown for special purposes rarely excite much 

 attention, save in the immediate districts of their cultiva- 

 tion, and though some one or two of them as, for instance, 

 hops and flax are in this country invested with a general 

 interest, the others are uncared for by most, and indeed 

 totally unknown to many of those occupied in the ordi- 

 nary farming pursuits 



There are a few of this class, however, which retain a 

 position among our " Farm Crops/' and are still to be 

 met with forming 1 a limited cultivation in the different 



O 



parts of the country, where either the soil, climate, or 

 local circumstances render the districts suitable for them. 

 Among these we find the TEAZLE, a plant indigenous to 

 this country, and seen frequently growing wild in the 

 hedgerows and waste places where the soils contain a cer- 

 tain proportion of argillaceous matter. The wild teazle 

 has no economic value whatsoever. The cultivated plant 

 is supposed, however, to be merely a variety of the wild 

 teazle, the changed form of its bracts, which constitute 

 its peculiar value for the purposes to which it is techni- 

 cally applied, being due to and sustained by continuous 

 cultivation. 1 We have no very definite records of the 

 early history of the teazle; we can only trace it back in 

 connection with the manufacture in which it plays so im- 

 portant a part; so that, indeed, although many are dis- 

 posed, from its frequent occurrence in this country, to look 



1 It is a somewhat remarkable circumstance, that although in harvesting 

 and disposing of the crop many seeds must be left on the ground and dispersed, 

 the cultivated variety is very rarely met with wild, even in the neighbourhood 

 of the growing crops. 



VOL. II. 59 



