LINAGES. 57 



discovered in tropical Western Africa. The Anisandenias have only 

 been observed in the mountains of India; Ixonanthes in tropical 

 South-Western Asia. Aneulophus is from tropical Western Africa. 

 The genera Erythroonylon, Hugonia, Ochthocosmus, and Linum are 

 common to both worlds. In counting the species of these four 

 genera, we find in all about twenty-three American to ninety-four 

 belonging to the old World. In the genus Linum, the species are 

 very unequally spread in all regions of the globe,^ but they are 

 met with from the tropical zones to the coldest regions of North 

 America, Asia, and Europe, and also from the South of Africa to 

 New Zealand. The common Flax is cultivated ia cold and in 

 warm regions, as in Egypt, where it is possible to water it. Its 

 culture on the banks of the Nile is most ancient, since we find it 

 in the stuffs which wrap the mummies and in the hypogeum paint- 

 ings. The Hebrews, Celts, and Germans planted it to make cloth. 

 Its name would seem to point to temperate .Europe as the place of 

 its origin ; ^ yet it has been said to be of Eastern origin,^ and also to 

 grow spontaneously in Central Russia and towards the Caspian Sea.* 

 It appears in its wild state South of the Caucasus. L. Radiola grows 

 in the Orkneys and Norway, and is found as far south as tropical 

 Africa.^ L. catharticum spreads through all Europe, from Southern 

 Italy to Iceland ; L. gallicum, from France to • Abyssinia f the last 

 has been introduced into Australia.''' 



The affinity of the lAnece with the Geraniacece is so close that some 

 authors have united the two groups. The Oooalidece have sometimes 

 been ranged among the Linacece. Of the Linece, Bentham; and 

 Hooker ^ say, " connected by authors sometimes with the Malvacece 

 and Oaryophpllece, sometimes with the Geraniacece, they differ 

 clearly from the two former families by the situation of the ovules, 

 and from the latter by their non-lobed ovaries ; and they are 



1 PiANCHON has givenageneral table of their liter ex Oriente orttim"). 



geographical distribution and that of all the ^ Ledeb. Fl. Ross. i. 425. 



Linacese then known (loc. cit. opposite page = Oliv. Fl. Trap. Afr. i. 268. 



599.) ° Lecoq. G6oyr. Bot. v. 316. 



== A. DC. Geogr. Sot. Mais. 390, 833. ' Benth. Fl. Austral, i. 283. 



^ Pl. in Sooie. Journ. loe. cit. 185 (" verosimi- * Q-en. 241. 

 VOL. V, I 



