274 
TRUTH. 
BITTER-SWEET NIGHTSHADE. 
The ancients thought that truth was the 
mother of the virtues, the daughter of time, 
and the queen of the world. We moderns 
say that that divinity hides herself at the 
bottom of a well, and that she always min¬ 
gles some bitterness with her sweets; and 
we appoint for her emblem an useless plant 
that loves the shade and is ever clothed in 
green. The bitter-sweet nightshade is, we 
believe, the only plant in our climate, that 
sheds and reproduces its foliage twice in one 
year. Its roots smell somewhat like the po¬ 
tato, and being chewed, produce a sensation 
of bitterness on the palate, which is succeed¬ 
ed by sweetness. From this singular fact it 
derives its specific name “ bitter-sweet.” 
