ENCHANTER'S NIGHTSHADE 



49 



Enchanter's Nightshade (Circaea Lutetiana, L.) 



This woodland wild flower is found in the North Temperate Zone 

 in Europe, N. Africa, Siberia, Western Asia as far east as the 

 Himalayas, and in temperate America, and there are no earlier 

 records. In Great Britain it is general in the Peninsula, Channel, 

 Thames, Anglia, and Severn provinces; and in S. Wales generally 

 except in Radnor and Car- 

 marthen ; in N. Wales gene- 

 rally except in Montgomery 

 and Merioneth; in the Trent 

 province everywhere except 

 in S. Lines, throughout the 

 Mersey, H umber, Tyne, and 

 Lakes provinces. It is com- 

 mon in the West Lowlands 

 and in E. Lowlands, except 

 in Peebles, Selkirk, and Lin- 

 lithgow; in the E. High- 

 lands, except in Stirling, 

 Banff, and Elgin; in the 

 West Highlands, except in 

 Mid Ebudes; and in the 

 N. Highlands, except in E. 

 Sutherland. In Yorkshire 

 it ascends to 1200 ft. 



Enchanter's Nightshade 

 is a familiar denizen of woods 

 and copses, preferring the 

 dark depths of shade beneath 

 the outspreading branches of woodland trees, or else the comparative 

 light diffused in the rides which intersect a wood, where it grows 

 amid the wet herbage which grows rank and rife, untouched by 

 browsing animals or the scythe. Occasionally it turns up in the 

 garden or on waste ground. 



This plant has a characteristic habit, the central stem being nearly 

 or suberect, with wide-spreading nearly patent branches, i.e. almost 

 at right angles. It is purple in colour and downy. The leaves are 

 egg-shaped at the base to heart-shaped, on long, nearly round or sub- 

 rotund leaf-stalks, glandular, pale green underneath, and alternate. 



VOL. III. 34 



ENCHANTER'S NIGHTSHADE (Circcea Lutetiana, L.) 



