onagracEjE. 20 



■with reddish below especially at the nodes, sub-glabrous, with the 

 stem, rachis, peduncles, calyx, petioles, veins and margins of the 

 leaves more or less hairy. 



Common Enchanter's- Nightshade. 



French, Circee Commune. German, Gemeines llexenkraut. 



Dr. Prior tells us that " the name of this plant has, by some blunder, been trans- 

 ferred from the Mandrake (Atropa maudragora) to an insignificant garden-weed. The 

 Mandrake was called Nightshade, from having been classed with the Sulana and 

 Enchanters, from its Latin name Circrea, Greek K<p«ua, given to it after the goddess 

 Circe ; or, as Dioscorides has it, quoted by Westmacott, ' 'Twas called Circsea, because 

 Circe, an enchantress, expert in herbs, used it as a tempting powder in amorous 

 concerns.' " 



SPECIES II.— CIRC M A A L PIN A. Linn. 

 Plate DXII. 



Stem generally glabrous or very thinly hairy except at the top. 

 Leaves slightly shining above, long-stalked, ovate, cordate or sub- 

 cordate at the base, acuminate at the apex, remotely denticulate- 

 serrate. Raceme generally with very minute bracts at the base of 

 the pedicels. Disk scarcely projecting beyond the orifice of the 

 calyx-tube. Petals inversely deltoid, 2-cleft. Fruit oblanceolate- 

 ovoid, sub-acute, 1-celled and 1-seeded, clothed with spreading soft 

 bristly slightly-hooked hairs. 



In woods, banks, and stony places. Common in hilly countries. 

 In Wales, York, the Lake district, and throughout the whole of the 

 Scotch Highlands, extending to Orkney. 



England, Scotland, Ireland. Perennial. Summer. 



This comes very near C. lutetiana, but is a smaller plant, the 

 stems 3 inches to 1 foot high, the petioles longer in proportion, the 

 lamina? of the leaves thinner, yellower green, more shining, usually 

 more deeply cordate at the base, more acuminate, and much more dis- 

 tinctly dentate or dentate-serrate. The pedicels have usually minute 

 bracts at the base, but this sometimes occurs in C. lutetiana ; the 

 flowers are smaller, with the petals much more narrowed at the 

 base ; the green disk which lines the calyx-tube projects much 

 less, and is not so evidently 2-lobed. The fruit-pedicels are less 

 reflexed, the fruit itself commonly breaks off when the plant is 

 dried, instead of remaining attached to the pedicel as in C. lute- 

 tiana ; it is narrower and more pointed, from one of the cells 

 being usually abortive, and the hairs upon it are much less stiff 

 and less hooked at the end. 



C. intermedia (Ehrh.) is generally considered as a variety of 

 this species by those botanists who do not hold it distinct both 



