DIFFERENT VARIETIES. 85 



tion of the five stamens, set close around the pistil, which, 

 as it develops, forms a globular bacciform fruit, embraced 

 by a five-lobed calyx. This fruit, which changes in colour 

 from green to black, is rilled with a great number of grains 

 in a thick liquid, exhaling a nauseous odour. As for the 

 leaves, they resemble those of spinach, for which, in some 

 countries, they serve as a substitute. 



Like all plants found by the wayside, and among heaps 

 of refuse, the nightshade loves to vary its form, and of its 

 various forms some nomenclators have made as many dif- 

 ferent species. The typical variety, the Solatium nigrum, 

 has glabrous stems and leaves, that is, they are covered 

 with short, but hardly visible hairs ; its berries are black. 



The smooth variety, or Solatium villosum, is rather rare, 

 and has swollen or bulging leaves and stems; its berries 

 are red or of a reddish yellow. The two varieties seem 

 able, by sowing, to be transformed into one another. A 

 sub-variety of the Solatium mllosum has been described as 

 a peculiar species, under the name of Solatium miniatum, 

 so named on account of its vermilion- coloured berries. The 

 Solatium ochroleiicum and Solatium luteovirens, the first with 

 yellowish, and the second with greenish berries, are simply 

 varieties, and the same may be said of the dwarf form, 

 known by the name of Solatium humile. 



But the physician is more interested in the solanum than 

 either the gardener or botanist. For him it is no useless or 

 noxious weed, but, on the contrary, is an eminently precious 

 herb. And, in fact, if it possessed only one-half the virtues 



