PENTANDRIA.
258. MASTIC is a resinous substance, obtained from a low tree or shrub (Pistacia lentiscus) which grows in the Levant.
It has alternate winged leaves, consisting of several pairs of spear-shaped leaflets, and spikes of very small flowers, which issue from the junction of the leaves with the branches.
The mode in which this resin is obtained is by making incisions across the tree in different parts. From these the juice exudes in drops, that are suffered to run upon the ground, and there to remain until they are sufficiently hard to be collected for use. The season for this process commences in the dry weather at the beginning of August, and lasts until the end of September. The best mastic is that imported from the island of Scio. We receive it in semi-transparent grains of yellowish colour. These emit an agreeable smell when heated; and, when chewed, they first crumble, and afterwards stick together, and become soft and white like wax.
With the Turkish women it is customary to chew this resin for the purpose of rendering their breath agreeable, and under a notion also that it tends to make their teeth white, and to strengthen the gums. They also mix it in fragrant waters, and burn it with other odoriferous substances, by way of perfume. It was formerly much used in medicine, as a remedy against pain in the teeth and gums; and, dissolved in spirit of wine, as a relief in obstinate and long continued coughs: but it is now almost wholly disused for these purposes; and is chiefly employed in the composition of varnish, and by dentists, for filling up the cavities of decayed teeth.
The wood of the mastic-tree is imported in thick knotty pieces, covered externally with an ash-coloured bark. This wood is accounted a mild, balsamic astringent; and a preparation of it, under the name of aurum potabile, is strongly recommended, by some of the German writers, in coughs, nausea, and weakness of the stomach.
259. HEMP is the fibrous part of the stalks of a plant (Cannabis sativa, Fig. 82) which grows wild in the East Indies, and is much cultivated in different parts of Europe.
It has the lower leaves in slender finger-like divisions; the male flowers in small loose spikes, at the end of the stem and branches; and the female flowers single, at the junction of the leaves and stem.
The principal country for hemp, as an article of commerce, is Russia, few other countries of Europe growing a quantity sufficient for their own consumption. It is cultivated in some parts of Britain, but particularly in the counties of Suffolk and Norfolk. The soil best adapted to it is a moist but loose sandy loam, or the black mould of low lands near water. The seed is sown in April or May; and the plants, which attain the height of five or six feet, are in a state to be pulled up in three or four months; the male plant, or fimble hemp, as it is called, being ready some time before the female plants, which have the name of karle or seed-hemp.
As soon as the hemp is pulled, it is tied in bundles and set up to dry; and, at the end of about ten days, the bundles are loosened at the top, and the heads are held upon a hurdle by one person, whilst another, with a small threshing-flail, beats out the seed.