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yellow flower. It is native of Loinbardy, and flowers with us from 

 January to March. 



The second has transverse roots, externally rough and knotted, 

 with many dependent fibres, and some large roots striking down ; the 

 scapes from six inches to near a foot in length, round, upright, varie- 

 gated with red, rising from a sheath, and terminated usually with 

 one flower, sometimes two, and very rarely three: corolla very large, 

 generally white at first, but frequently with a tint of red, growing 

 deeper with age, but finally becoming green. It is a native of 

 Italy, Sec. flowering from December to March. Martyn observes, 

 that " it has the name of Black Hellebore from the colour of the root; 

 and of Christmas Hose, from the time of flowering and the colour of 

 the corolla." 



The third has a round stem, a little branched at top, but not near 

 so much as in the next sort; leafy, reddish at the base, upright, smooth, 

 a foot or eighteen inches in height: the leaves not of a stiff leathery 

 consistence, as in the next species, but soft and of a lighter green ; 

 those from the bottom are on long petioles, but those on the stem sit 

 close to their sheaths: the leaflets (seven to ten) lanceolate, acuminate, 

 sharply serrate, smooth, gashed, usually trifid, the divisions some- 

 times deeply lobed; and at the base of each peduncle is a similar 

 leaf, only smaller: the peduncles axillary, an inch long, round; sup- 

 porting two (sometimes only one) nodding, green flowers. It is a 

 native of France, &c. flowering in March and April. 



The fourth has a small but bent root, with a prodigious number 

 of slender dark-coloured fibres: the stem is from eighteen inches to 

 near a yard in height, towards the bottom round, strong, naked, 

 marked with alternate scars, the vestiges of former leaves; dividing 

 and subdividing at top into many branches, producing great abun- 

 dance of flowers pendent, of a pale yellowish colour: the leaves com- 

 posed of eight or nine long narrow lobes, joined at their base, 

 commonly four on each side, united at the bottom, and one in the 

 middle of the foot-stalk, serrate, and ending in acute points; those 

 on the lower part much larger than those on the upper, of a deep 



