The fruit is a globose berry, standing in a large cup, and containing three cells. The receptacle is convex on both sides, and kidney-shaped.

The seeds are numerous, and kidney-shaped also.

The Species.

The first of the species here enumerated is the plant in question. The second has been found growing naturally in no other country than Spain. The third was first discovered by Father Feuillée in Peru, and is therefore only an inhabitant of the gardens in this part of the world.

The Description.

The root is perennial. It is pretty long, and divided into many branches of a brown colour, succulent, and of a disagreeable smell. The radical leaves are frequently a foot long, and five inches broad, of an oval acuminated figure, and not sinuated on the edges. The stalk rises to three or four feet: it is much divaricated and branched. The cauline leaves stand alternately upon it, in shape like the radical, of a dusky-green colour on the upper part, and a paler green underneath, being a little hairy on both sides. The flowers stand on single footstalks, in the alæ of the leaves: they are large, of a campanulated figure, and striated, of a dusky-purple colour within, with a yellow variegated base; the outer surface of the flower is of a greenish red. After the flower succeeds a fine beautiful large berry, which is black when ripe. For the rest, take in the generical character.

Most of the old authors give us figures of this plant, which, tho' they convey a general idea of it, are yet scarce any of them exact. This fault in general runs thro' all, that I have had an opportunity of examining; namely, that the flowers and fruit are represented by much too large in proportion to the leaves. Morison's is perhaps one of the best among the old figures: it is, upon the whole, tolerable, but not accurate on account of the before-mentioned objection. Petiver's does by no means represent the plant justly, in that the alæ of the leaves are not properly filled up. The most accurate figure of all, that I have seen, is Mr. Miller's, in his plates adapted to the Gardeners Dictionary, which is undoubtedly taken from nature itself.

Place of Growth.

The Deadly Nightshade is found in many parts of Europe, especially in England and in Austria; and yet in our own country it is happily not very plentiful, inasmuch as our botanical writers usually reckon it among the more rare plants, and specify particularly the places where they have observed it.