FLAX FAMILY. Llnaceae. 



green foliage, the thickish, resinous leaflets very small, in 

 pairs, with almost no leaf-stalk, and uneven at base. The 

 pretty flowers are nearly an inch across, with bright yellow 

 petals, with claws, and silky, greenish-yellow sepals which 

 soon drop off. The filaments are broadened below into 

 wings and have a scale on the inner side. The ovary is 

 covered with pale, silky hairs, so that the older flowers 

 have a silky tuft in the center, and becomes a round, 

 densely hairy fruit, with a short stalk, tipped with the 

 slender style. These little white, silky balls of down are 

 very conspicuous and, as they are mingled with yellow 

 flowers, the bush has an odd and pretty effect of being 

 spotted all over with yellow and white. 



FLAX FAMILY. Linaceae. 



A small family, widely distributed in temperate and 

 tropical regions. Ours are smooth herbs, with loosely 

 clustered, complete flowers, having five sepals; five petals, 

 alternating with the sepals; five stamens, alternating with 

 the petals, with swinging anthers and filaments united at 

 the base; ovary superior; fruit a capsule, containing eight 

 or ten, oily seeds. 



There are many kinds of Flax, sometimes shrubby at 

 base; with tough fibers in the bark; leaves without stipules, 

 sometimes with glands at base in place of real stipules; 

 flowers mostly blue or yellow. There are numerous, small- 

 flowered, annual kinds, difficult to distinguish and usually 

 somewhat local. L. usitatissimum, an annual, with deep 

 blue flowers, is the variety which, from time immemorial, 

 has furnished the world with linen from its fiber and oil 

 from its seeds. Linum is the ancient Latin name. 



An attractive plant, from one to two 

 Linum Lewisii ^ eet ta ^ w ^ severa l> erect stems, spring- 

 Blue ing from a woody, perennial root, with 

 Spring, summer numerous, small, narrow, bluish-green 

 West, etc. leaves and loose clusters of pretty flowers, 

 each about an inch across. The petals, delicately veined 

 with blue, vary in tint from sky-blue to almost white, 

 with a little yellow at the base. This is common and 

 widely distributed, from Manitoba to Texas and westward, 

 but the fiber is not strong enough to be used commercially. 



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