414 



HISTORY OF THE VEGETABLE KINGDOM 



of the lower female plant. The seeds which 

 have grown on the same stalk produce both male 

 and female plants indiscriminately, and the differ- 

 ence cannot be known until the plants are some- 

 what advanced in growth. When the seed is 

 put into the ground it is therefore quite uncer- 

 tain what proportion there will be of each; yet 

 here too we have occasion to mark the admirable 

 arrangements of nature, for the due proportion 

 of each generally make their appearance. The 

 seeds are sown about the end of April. The 

 male plants are usually puUed about the begin- 

 ning of July, and the female in a month or five 

 weeks after, when they have ripened their 

 seeds. 



A rich moist soil is most favourable for the 

 full growth of hemp; but it will grow on any 

 soil if well manured, except on a stiff clay, where 

 it does not thrive well. A poor light soil yields 

 but a small return, although the quality is fine; 

 while a strong rich soil yields abundantly, but 

 the quality is inferior. 



The fibre of hemp produces a cloth much 

 stronger than that of flax; but its principal use 

 is for the manufacture of cordage, for which its 

 great tenacity particularly adapts it. 



The seeds yield by expression an oil, which 

 the Russians use in their cookery, and which 

 painters employ in this country. The seeds are 

 reckoned also a good and nutritious food for 

 poultry, and are supposed to increase the number 

 of hen's eggs. Small birds are in general very 

 fond of them; but they must be given to caged 

 birds with caution, and mixed with other seeds, 

 else they prove too stimulating. The bullfinches 

 and goldfinches by feeding on hemp seed, change 

 the red of their plumage to a black. 



The leaves of hemp possess a strong narcotic 

 quality, and they form the basis of the well 

 known Turkish intoxicating drug called hang, 

 or huscMsch. 



There is little doubt that hemp was indigenous 

 in Europe. We have records of its growth here 

 for nearly two thousand five hundred years. 

 Herodotus (book iv. 74) says "Hemp grows in 

 the country of the Scythians, which, except in 

 the thickness and height of the stalk, very much 

 resembles flax; in the qualities mentioned, how- 

 ever, the hemp is much superior. It grows in 

 a natural state, and is also cultivated. The 

 Thracians make clothing of it very like linen 

 cloth; nor could any person, without being very 

 well acquainted with the substance, say whether 

 this clothing is made of hemp or flax. A person 

 who has never seen hempen cloth, would cer- 

 tainly suppose that this, of which I am speak- 

 ing, is made of flax." The Scythians of Hero- 

 dotus lived in Europe, north of the Danube, 

 and bordering on the Black sea. 



The shirts worn by the peasants in the greatest 

 part of Russia, are made of hempen cloth; and 



they wear very large full breeches of the same 

 coarse material. 



The hemp plant was well known to the Ro- 

 mans as a material for cordage in the time of 

 Pliny. This naturalist describes its culture and 

 the preparation to which it was subjected, in 

 order to obtain its fibres, classing these in two 

 different qualities. The filaments nearest to the 

 outer bark and to the reed were considered in- 

 ferior to those growing in the middle, and were 

 distinguished by the name of mesa. But in 

 consequence of their supposed greater liability 

 to be damaged by exposure to moisture, hempen 

 cords, and particularly cables, were not so highly 

 esteemed at that time as were those made from 

 spartium, which were thought to be better quali- 

 fied for resisting the injurious action of water. 



Pliny eulogizes the root, juice, and other parts 

 of this plant, as possessing wonderful medicinal 

 virtues, for which it appears to have obtained a 

 higher value in those days than for its excellent 

 adaptation to the manufacture of cordage, an 

 application at present considered so important as 

 to cause its other properties to be almost entirely 

 disregarded. 



Hemp is grown in Persia, Egypt, and various 

 parts of the East Indies; in Africa, in the United 

 States of America, in Canada, and Nova Scotia. 

 Marco Polo mentions that hemp and flax, as well 

 as great quantities of cotton, were cultivated in 

 his time in the neighbourhood of Kashgar in 

 the lesser Bucharia, and in the province of Khoten 

 in Chinese Tartary. According to Mr Clarke 

 Abel, in China proper, though the Xing-ma 

 (Sida tiliwfolia) is preferred for cordage, the 

 Ge ma (Cannabis sativa, or hemp) is also culti- 

 vated and manufactured into ropes. At Tung- 

 chow, that distinguished naturalist saw the sida 

 and cannabis growing together, the first in long 

 ridges or in fields like the miUet, the second in 

 small patches. 



Dampier was told that the Spaniards at Leon 

 in South America, near the Pacific ocean, made 

 cordage of hemp, but he saw no manufactory. 

 Thunberg, on a journey from the Cape of Good 

 Hope into the interior of Africa, found the Hot- 

 tentots cultivating hemp. "This is a plant," 

 says he, "universally used in this country, though 

 for a purpose very different from that to which 

 it is applied by the industrious Europeans. The 

 Hottentot loves nothing so well as tobacco, and 

 with no other thing can he be so easily enticed 

 into servitude; but for smoking he finds tobacco 

 not sufficiently strong, and therefore mixes it 

 with hemp chopped very fine." 



Hemp is cultivated in Great Britain and Ire- 

 land, but not very abundantly. The counties of 

 England in which it is principally grown are, 

 Suffolk, Yorkshire, Somersetshire, and the fens 

 of Lincolnshire; in Norfolk and Dorsetshire 

 some few hemp grounds are lilicwise to be seen. 



