A195 
They (BoR'T DIS APH ERR Al. 
DIVISION I. FOREIGN SPECIES, 
1. Great hairy Flax. 
Linum ceruleum hirfutum. 
The root is fall, oblong, divided, and fur- 
nifhed with a few fibres. 
The ftalks are numerous and firm: they are 
three feet high, round, hard, brown, not much 
branched; yet, not altogether fo fingle as in the 
common flax. 
The leaves are oblong, confiderably broad, of 
a pale green colour, and hairy. 
They are placed irregularly on the ftalks, and 
cloath them pretty thick all the way up. 
The flowers grow all the way up the upper 
branches, and the tops of the ftalks: they are 
very large, and of a beautiful blue. 
The feed-veffel is large and pointed; and the 
feeds are oval and of a pale brown. 
It is common in Germany, and flowers in 
June. 
C. Bauhine calls it Linum filveftre latifolium 
birfutum cerulenm. 
2. Small yellow Flax. 
Linum parvum flore luteo. 
The root is long, flender, and edged with 
fibres, 
The ftalks are numerous, flender, and fix or 
eight inches high: they frequently divide into 
two from the bafe ; but they are rarely branched 
upwards. 
The leaves are fmall, oblong, narrow, and 
fharp pointed: they are placed irregularly on 
the ftalks, and are perfectly fmooth, and of a 
pale green. 
The flowers are fmall, and of a gold yellow: 
_ they grow at the tops of the ftalks, and on flen- 
der footftalks rifing from the boforhs of the upper 
leaves. 
Thefe generally fplit into two at the extremity. 
The feed-veffel is fmall and pointed. 
The feeds are oval and brown. j 
__ This is the fpecies which has only three ftyles 
in the flower; whereas Linnzeus’s chiracter gives 
all the flaxes five. 
It is a native of the fouth of France, and 
flowers in June, : 
C. Bauhine calls it Linum fylveftre. minus Slore 
Luteo. ‘i 
3. Broad leaved yellow Flax. 
Linum latifolium luteum ad genicula floridum. . 
The root is fmall, oblong, divided into feve- 
ral parts, and furnifhed with many long fibres. 
_ The ftalk is round, firm, and upright, but 
Jointed, and ufually bowed from joint to joint. 
The leaves are fhort and broad: they have no 
footftalks, but are fmall at the bafe, broadeft in 
the middle, and pointed at the ends; and they 
are placed irregularly on the ftalks. 
The flowers are moderately large, and of a 
pale yellow: they grow clofe to the ftalks at its 
feveral joints, or at the infertions of the upper 
leaves. 
The feed-veffel is large, roundith, and point- 
ed; and the feeds are brown. 
It is common in Italy, and flowers in Auguft. 
C. Bauhine calls it Linum luteum ad fingula 
genicula floridum. 
The virtues of thefe plants are not certainly 
known; but the tafte of their feeds feems-to 
fhew they have all the fame qualities with the 
common flax. 
Go be Bet Us. § VI. 
CRANESBILL. 
GERANIUM. 
HE flower confifts of five petals. The feed-veffel is long and flender: it is very fingular ; it is 
-properly a cruft which envelops the feveral feeds, and which has a top extended along the 
ftyle. As its form is fingular, fo is its manner of opening; for it fplits in feveral parts from the bafe 
to the extremity of the ftyle. The feeds are kidney-fhaped. The cup is compofed of five leaves, and 
remains when the flower is fallen. ' 
Linnaeus places this among the monadelpbia decandria; the threads in the fower growing together 
in one body, and being diftin€ly ten in number. 
This is one of thofe claffes of that author which we call, with reafon, perfectly artificial, for this 
coalition of the threads in a fower is not certain enough to become the mark of a claffical diftinétion, 
Nor appears to have been regarded bynature fo ftridtly as thofe parts and circumftances in all plants 
are, on which a natural method is to be founded. 
Linnzeus is obliged to acknowledge this, even in the moft plain terms, in relation to the pre- 
fent genus. : 
After having feparated it from all thofe other genera to which it is naturally allied, by placing ig 
among thefe monadelphia, becaufe its {tamina grow into one body, he owns that in fome of the fpecies 
_ the flower is plainly of the diadelphia clafs; that is, the ftamina unite. into two bodies, 
This divides the genus again: the plants whofe threads unite into one body make the fixteenth clafs_ 
in Linnzeus’s method ; and thofe whofe threads unite into two bodies make the feventeenth: there- 
fore, after the crane/bills being taken out of their natural place, the genus itfelf is to be divided, 
4 and 
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