Linum Lewisii. 31
usitatissimum. Petals flax-flower-blue beneath, darker above, streaked
with deep ultramarine-blue towards the base; claws yellow, stamens
enclosed in the kind of tube formed by the claws of the petals,
and the filaments only appearing when the flower is fully expanded.
Anthers straw-yellow, filaments white below, blue towards the top.
Styles white, stigma yellow. Calicine scales ovate, acute, (or under
a lens acuminated) marginated, and attenuated at base, with a pellucid
line in the centre, and somewhat dotted with diaphanous spots
under a lens. A native of the banks of the Missouri and Red river,
Kiamesia plains, and the vallies of the Rocky Mountains, growing
always on the declivities of water courses. Flowers in July.
The generic term Linum, *<«»», of Dioscorides, Theophrastus and
other Greek authors, is derived from to hold, owing to the
tenacity of the fibres of the bark, a property common to all the
species hitherto discovered, and one rendering this genus of plants
of inestimable value, in commerce and economy. This pretty species
of flax was discovered by the late captain Lewis, in his travels with
captain Clark, under the direction and at the expense of the government
of the United States. He found it growing in the vallies of
the Rocky Mountains, and on the banks of the Missouri. Pursh, who
first described this plant, affixed the name of captain Lewis to it, in
commemoration of the discovery. Mr. Nuttall informs me that it
begins to appear about fort Mandan, becoming more abundant towards
the mountains, but that he did not see it lower down on the
Missouri than the Mandan village; and on the banks of Red river,
near the plains of Kiamesia river, it is most abundant; that near Red