POTATO FAMILY. Solanaceae. 
There are a great many kinds of Solanum, abundant in 
tropical America; herbs or shrubs, sometimes climbing; 
often downy; calyx wheel-shaped, with five teeth or lobes, 
corolla wheel-shaped, the border plaited, with five angles 
or lobes and avery short tube; anthers sometimes grouped to 
form a cone, filaments short; fruit a berry, either enclosed 
in the calyx or with the calyx remaining on its base. This 
is the Latin name of the Nightshade, meaning “quieting.” 
Purple Nightshade This is much handsomer than most of 
Solanum Xénti. tue eastern Nightshades, hairy and sticky, 
Purple _ with several spreading stems, from one to 
Spring, summer three feet high, springing from a perennial 
California root, with thin, roughish leaves, more or 
less toothed. In favorable situations the flowers are 
beautiful, each about an inch across, and form handsome 
loose clusters. The corolla is saucer-shaped, bright purple, 
with a ring of green spots in the center, bordered with 
white and surrounding the bright yellow cone formed by 
the anthers. The berry is pale green or purple, the size 
of a small cherry. This is sometimes sweet-scented and is 
very fine on Mt. Lowe and elsewhere in southern Califor- 
nia, but is paler and smaller in Yosemite. Blue Witch, 
S. umbelliferum, is very similar, more woody below, with 
deep green stems, shorter branches, smaller, thicker leaves, 
and a dull white or purplish berry. It grows in the foot- 
hills of the Coast Ranges and Sierra Nevada Mountains 
and flowers chiefly in summer, but more or less all through 
the year. 
Nightshade A branching plant, about two feet high 
Solanum Douglésii 204 across, with roughish stems and thin, 
White - smooth or slightly hairy, dark green leaves, 
Spring, summer toothless, or the margins more or less 
——— coarsely toothed. The flowers are white, 
tinged with lilac, with a purplish ring surrounding the 
yellow cone formed by the anthers. In southern California 
the flowers are nearly half an inch across, but smaller 
elsewhere. The berriesare black. Thisiscommon through- 
out California near the coast. S. nigrum, the common 
Nightshade, is a weed in almost all countries, common in 
waste places and in cultivated soil, and has small white 
flowers and black berries, about as large as peas and = to 
be poisonous. 
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