URTICACER. 133 
is produced in Italy. For the production of good fibre the seed is sown close, so as to 
produce straight stems without branches. The harvesting takes place at two periods, 
the male plant being pulled up as soon as it has done flowering, and the female not 
until the seeds are ripe. After pulling, the leaves are struck off with a wooden sword, 
the stems are then tied in bundles, and steeped in water, or water-retted, as it is 
technically termed (the other processes, dew-retting and snow-retting, are sometimes 
substituted), the object being to loosen the fibre. They are then spread out to dry 
and bleach; this is called grassing ; after which the fibre is detached, either by pulling 
it off by manual labour, or by breaking the stems in a machine, and afterwards 
seutching them in a similar manner to that employed for the preparation of flax. The 
uses of hemp in making cordage, canvas, and the material known as brown holland, 
are well known. The seeds, or more properly the fruits containing the seed, are used 
for feeding cage birds. The imports of hemp in 1858 amounted to 739,339 ewts., the 
computed real value of which was 1,034,277/., and of hemp-seed 11,090 qrs., value 
24,0741. 
GENUS IV.—-HUMULUS. Linn. 
Flowers diccious. Male flowers with the perianth of 3 to 5 nearly 
equal sepals: stamens 5, erect. Female flowers in pairs in the axil 
of a bract, which enlarges much after flowering: perianth of 1 leaf, 
scalelike, embracing the ovary: style very short; stigmas 2, elongate 
and subulate. Achene indehiscent. Embryo with the cotyledons 
rolled up spirally. 
Perennial twining herbs, with opposite stalked palmately cut leaves 
resembling those of the vine, but rough and with united stipules. 
Male flowers in lax terminal and axillary panicles ; female flowers in 
conelike catkins, of which the bracts after flowering become large and 
foliaceous, and at length subscarious. 
The name of this genus of plants is derived from the word hwmus, the ground, as, 
unless supported or trained, the species fall to the earth. 
SPECIES I—-HUMULUS LUPULUS. Lim. 
Prare MCCLXXXIV. 
Reich. Ic. Fl. Germ. et Helv. Vol. XII. Tab. DCLVI. Fig. 1326. 
Billot, Fl. Gall. et Germ. Exsicc. No. 2741. 
Petioles not longer than the lamina of the leaf. Axis of male panicle 
straight. Scales of female catkin without resinous dots, otherwise 
glabrous. 
In damp woods and thickets, and in hedgerows. Not uncommon, and 
generally distributed in the south of England; more rare in the north, 
where it is probably not indigenous, as Mr. Baker, in his “ North 
Yorkshire,” states that “the heat of the summers of the low country 
is usually not intense enough to properly ripen the seeds.” In Scotland 
