1 14 Dawson. — On the Structure of 
4. Hemp ( Cannabis sativa) fibres are long and narrow, with 
a very narrow lumen. Their ends, however, are 
slightly flattened, and their micro-chemical reactions 
distinguish them from the fibres of which the paper is 
made : thus they give a yellowish colour with aniline 
sulphate, green with iodine and H 2 So 4 , and in Cu. 
Amm. they swell greatly, showing longitudinal stria- 
tions, with a comparatively broad central wavy line. 
5. Flax ( Linum perenne ) fibres are long and narrow, the 
walls are thick and non-lignified, and show charac- 
teristic swellings or kinks, where fibres have crossed 
one another. Their behaviour, under the action of 
Cu. Amm., is strictly comparable to that of the fibres 
of the paper. The chemical reaction of the walls also 
agrees closely in the two cases. 
A comparison of the above results shows at once that we 
must exclude the fibres of Cotton, Nettle, Boehmeria , and 
Hemp. I was unable to examine those of Broussonetia , but 
Wiesner’s 1 description of them puts them also on one side. 
On the contrary, the shape, narrow lumen, and pointed 
ends, the chemical properties of the walls, their reaction with 
cupric ammonia, longitudinal striations, tendency to fray into 
fibrillae, and the traces of slight swellings or kinks, all 
point to the conclusion that we are dealing with bast-fibres 
of Flax 
Considering the subject from a historical standpoint, we 
learn from De Candolle 2 that Flax was familiar to the 
Chaldeans, Egyptians, and Hebrews. The plant figures in 
Egyptian drawings, and, as the microscope has revealed, the 
bandages, used as mummy-wrappings, were made of linen. 
Moreover, the annual Flax was cultivated for thousands of 
years in Mesopotamia, Assyria, and Egypt, and it was, and 
still is, found wild in the districts lying between the Persian 
Gulf and the Caspian and Black Seas. 
1 J. Wiesner, Die Rohstoffe des Pflanzenreiches, p. 459. 
2 De Candolle, Origin of Cultivated Plants, 1884, pp. 1 23-130. 
