130 THE STORY OF PLANT LIFE 



Ireland and the Channel Islands. The distribution 

 no doubt depends largely in many cases upon its 

 former (and to some extent present) use in medicine. 



The habitat is waste places, sandy stony ground, 

 roadsides. Henbane appears to be more common on 

 chalky ground, like other members of the group (as 

 Black Nightshade, or Solanum, and Deadly Night- 

 shade), or by the sea. I have seen it on kitchen- 

 middens and in old limestone quarries, and it grows 

 near granaries and other kindred gathering-grounds 

 for casuals. 



The habit is erect. The stem is stout, round in 

 section, and branched. The whole plant is clammy, 

 with soft, glandular hairs. The radical leaves are 

 stalked, ovate. The stem-leaves are oblong, clasping, 

 with several lobes, and a wavy margin, or sinuate ; 

 or the leaf may be nearly divided to the base. 



The flowers are in two ranks, and nearly stalkless 

 or shortly stalked, in the axils below, the upper 

 sessile, in a spike, one-sided, recurved before 

 flowering. They are lurid yellow, with dark purple 

 veins and a darker centre, which are sometimes want- 

 ing. The calyx is five-toothed, with broad prickly 

 lobes, with an ovoid tube, and a more or less cylindrical 

 limb, short in flower, enlarged in fruit and persistent. 

 The lobes of the corolla are broad, nearly equal. 

 The anthers are purple. The capsules are erect, 

 two-celled, with many seeds, and membranous. 



The plant is 1-3 ft. in height. It flowers between 

 June and September, and is a herbaceous biennial. 



