194 HYOSCYAMUS NIGER 



the base of the corolla-tube, but adherent to it for half way up 

 and there slightly hairy, filaments slender, shorter than the 

 corolla but somewhat exserted, anthers dorsifixed, purple, 

 dehiscing longitudinally. Ovary about as long as, and inclosed 

 in the tube of the calyx, smooth, 2 -celled, with a thin partition 

 and large axile placentas ; style a little exceeding tha stamens. 

 Fruit a capsule, enclosed in the globular tube of the enlarged 

 persistent calyx, now an inch long, tough, coriaceous, and with 

 prominent, stiff veins ; pericarp smooth, gibbous at the base, the 

 portion in contact with the calyx-tube membranous and semi- 

 transparent, the top hard and rigid, forming a cap or lid, along 

 the lower edge of which dehiscence takes place, 2-celled. Seeds 

 very numerous, closely packed on the large, spongy placentas, 

 roundish- oval in outline, about T ' 5 inch wide, hollowed slightly on 

 each side, brown, marked with fine but conspicuous, prominent 

 reticulations ; embryo much curved in the endosperm. 



Habitat. A native of this country, and not uncommon in 

 sandy ground, the borders of commons^ waste places, and the sea- 

 coast in some parts abundant ; scarcely native in Scotland. It 

 is found throughout Europe except the extreme north, and is 

 very common in the Mediterranean regions and Western Asia, 

 extending to India and Siberia. In America it is an old intro- 

 duction. For medicinal purposes it is cultivated in Surrey, 

 Herts, Bedfordshire, and Cambridgeshire ; the biennial plant which 

 produces merely a large tuft of spreading radical leaves in the 

 autumn of the first year, being preferred. A variety without 

 the purple veins in the corolla, which is thus entirely of a pale 

 yellow colour, has been named H. pallidus, Kit. II. agrestis, 

 Kit, is the small, annual form. 



Dunal, 1. c., p. 546; Syme, E., Bot., vi, 106; Hook. 1, Stud. Fl., 

 p. 255; Wats., Comp. Cyb. Br., p. 251; Gren. & Godr., Fl. 

 France, ii, 546; Ledebour, Fl. Boss, iii, p. 192; Lindl., Fl. 

 Med., p. 508. 



Official Parts and Names. HYOSCYAMI FOLIA ; the fresh leaves 

 with the branches to which they are attached ; also the leaves 

 ^separated from the branches and carefully dried ; gathered from 



