HISTOLOGY OF FLAX FRUIT 



* 



Kate Barber Winton 



(with FOUR figures) 



Flax (Linum usitatissimum L.), although grown throughout the 

 temperate zone for its fiber, is valuable as well for its seed, which 

 yields the well known linseed oil, the residue being used as a cattle 

 food. The chaff from the threshing of the seeds, consisting of 

 broken pods and stems with varying amounts of immature and 

 broken seeds, has of late come into the cattle food market under 

 the name "flax bran." 



The histology of the fiber is described by von Hohnel/ 

 Hanausek, 2 and other technical microscopists, and that of the 

 seed by writers on the microscopy of foods 

 and drugs, 3 but the elements of the pericarp 

 appear to have escaped attention except for 

 brief mention by Collin and Perrot, 4 with 

 whom the present writer does not entirely 



a 8 ree - ^ ^ Fig. i.— Dehiscing 



The yellowish pods (fig. i), 8 mm. in length, fruit with sepals; X2. 

 are slightly broader than long, with five 

 pointed sepals and a slender pedicel. Each of the five locules is 

 incompletely halved by a false dissepiment, making a'10-celled 

 fruit which dehisces at maturity into ten valves. Each cell con- 

 tains a single flattened, shining, brown, mucilaginous seed. 



Calyx. — The outer epidermis consists of longitudinally elongated 

 cells with wavy walls and simple stomata. The cuticle has faint 

 longitudinal striations. 



Mesophyll. — Several layers of simple parenchyma cells, through 

 which runs a network of small bundles, form the mesophyll. 



The inner epidermis is similar to the outer. 



1 Die Mikroskopie der Technisch Verwendeten Faserstoffe. Wien, 2 Aufl. 

 J 905. p. 42. 



2 Microscopy of technical products. Trans, by Winton. New York. 1907. 



3 See bibliography in Winton, Microscopy of vegetable foods. New York. 



1906. p. 204. 



4 Les residues industriels. Paris. 1904. p. 202. 



445] 



[Botanical Gazette, vol. 58 



