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HELLEBORUS 
I. HELLEBORUS VIRIDIS. Green Hellebore. Plate 105 
Helleborastrum Gerard Herball 825 ( 1 597 ) > Helleborus niger hortensis flore viridi Ray Syn. ed. 3, 271 
(1724). 
Helleborus viridis L. Sp. PI. 558 (1753)!; Smith Eng. Bot. no. 200 (1794)!; FI. Brit. 598 (1800); 
Syme Eng . Bot. i, 56 (1863); Rouy et Foucaud FI. France i, 116 (1893). 
British plants seem all to be singularly constant and to conform to the following variety which is distinguished by its 
glabrous or nearly glabrous shoot without multicellular 
hairs, by its more pronounced serrations of the leaf- 
segments, by its smaller flowers which occur 2 — 3 (not 
1 — 2 together), by its larger oval (not suborbicular) 
sepals, by its shorter carpels, and by its incurved styles. 
(a) H. viridis var. smithianus A. Braun in 
hid. Sent. Hort. Berol. app. 14 (1861); H. viridis 
Smith loc. cit., in sensu stricto ! ; H. occidentalis 
Reuter [Cat. Gr. Geneve ex] Bull. Soc. Bot. France 
xvi, 53 [bis] (1869). 
leones : — Smith Eng. Bot. t. 200, as H. viridis-, 
Curtis FI. Loud, ii, 112, as H. viridis-, Reichenbach 
Icon, iv, t. 105, fig. 4718, as H. viridis. 
Camb. Brit. FI. iii. Plate 105. (a) Lower leaf. 
(b) Flowering branch. ( c ) Sepal and four nectar- 
leaves. ( d ) Head of follicles. Derbyshire. 
Exsiccata : — Bourgeau ( Pyr . Espagn.), 70, as 
H. viridis ; v. Heurck et Martinis, vii, 303, as H. 
viridis ; Thielens et Devos, iii, 203, as H. viridis ; 
Todaro, 334, as H. bocconi', Wirtgen, v, 16, as 
H. viridis ; Lojacono {PI. Sic. Rar .), 245, as H. 
bocconi. 
The plant of the Linnaean herbarium is not the 
British form. 
Perennial. Rhizome stout, oblique, rather 
short. Shoot glabrous. Radicle leaves aestival, 
with long petioles, petioles somewhat dilated 
at the base ; laminae digitate, each main seg- 
ment with 2 — 4 lobes, lobes elliptical and acute, 
margin of the lobes coarsely serrate. Upper leaves sessile. Flowers vernal, 3 '5 — 5 cm. in diameter, 
drooping ; March and April. Sepals green (rarely blotched with purple), oval, shortly and bluntly 
acuminate, usually 5. Petals or nectar-leaves about 7 — 12, about a quarter or a third as long as the 
sepals, shorter than the stamens. Styles incurved. Follicles slightly connate at the base. 
H. viridis var. smithianus occurs in ash woods and in oak and ash woods and scrub, in lowland districts, 
usually on calcareous soil ; more or less indigenous in several counties from Dorset and Kent to Northumber- 
land and Wigtonshire, but very doubtfully so in many of its recorded stations. 
Western Germany, Belgium, France, western Switzerland, Spain, Italy (inch Sicily). 
The aggregate species H. viridis occurs in Denmark (? indigenous), Germany, Belgium, France, 
central Europe, Spain, and Italy. It is naturalised in Scandinavia, northern Germany, Holland, and 
North America. 
2 . HELLEBORUS FOETIDUS. Stinking Hellebore. Plate 106 
Hellebor aster maximus Gerard Herball 826 (1597); Ray Syn. ed. 3, 271 (1724). 
Helleborus foetidus L. Sp. PI. 558 (1753)!; Smith Eng. Bot. no. 613 (1799); FI. Brit. 598 (1800); 
Syme Eng. Bot. 58 (1863); Rouy et Foucaud FI. France i, 118 (1893). 
leones: — Smith Eng. Bot. t. 613; Woodville Med. Bot. i, t. 19; Reichenbach Icon, iv, t. 103, fig. 4715. 
Camb. Brit. FI. iii. Plate 106. (a) Lower leaf, (b) Flowering branch. ( c ) Portion of stem, (d) Portion 
of flower, showing pedicel, sepal, nectar-leaves, and stamens. (e) Nectar-leaves. (/) Stamens. (g) Head of 
follicles with persistent perianth, Hort., origin I. of Wight (E. W. H.). 
Exsiccata: — Billot, 1496; Welwitsch {Iter Lu sit i), 384. 
