not nodoso-articulated stems and branches, sometimes armed with thorns or prickles; their leaves are alternate, simple, entire or lobed, or even pinnatisected, the floral ones occasionally double, and approximated to each other.

The inflorescence is variable, mostly axillary, sometimes extra-axillary or terminal, the pedicels ebracteate, and the flowers regular, and in general united. The calyx is free, herbaceous, persistent, rarely circumscissile, with a deciduous limb (as in Datura), synpetalous, 5- (rarely 3-4) parted, and the segments equal or but slightly unequal. The corolla is hypogynous, deciduous, synpetalous, and staminiferous, with a 5-, rarely 4 cleft limb, the lobes equal (very seldom unequal) and alternate in their exsertion to the lobes of the calyx, and mostly plicate in æstivation. The stamina are epipetalous, definite, equal in number to the lobes of the corolla and alternate with them, hence 5, rarely reduced to 4, by the

A. Atropa Belladonna. Cutting, to shew alternate leaves, axillary inflorescence, flowers, and fruit. (a) Corolla laid open, to shew the stamens. (b) The pistil. (d) The fruit.

B. Datura Stramonium. Cutting, with leaves, flower, and young fruit. (a) Corolla bearing the stamens. (b) Pistil. (c) Transverse section of the fruit. (d) A seed.

(a) Staminiferous corolla laid open.
(c) Young fruit without the calyx.
(e) A seed.

abortion of the upper or adaxial one. The filaments are free, very rarely connate, none sterile, mostly equal, sometimes unequal, the lower ones being the longest. The anthers are innate, erect or incumbent, 2-celled, with apposite parallel locules, dehiscent lengthwise by chinks, rarely by apicial pores. The germen is formed of two incumbent carpels, i. e. adaxial and abaxial in their position,

2-celled, sometimes falsely 4-celled (as in Datura), or many-celled (as in Nicotiana multivalvis), and many-ovuled. The style and continuous, and the stigma entire or 2-lobed.

The fruit is capsular or baccate, 2-valved and 2-celled, (rarely many-valved and sub-quadrilocular, or many-celled,) when capsular, with a double dissepiment parallel to the valves, when baccate, with the placentæ adhering to the dissepiments. The seeds are indefinite, sessile, and exarillate. The albumen fleshy, the embryo included, often excentrical, more or less curved, (seldom straight,) the radicle turned towards the hilum, and the cotyledons entire, and cylindrical or foliaceous.

(4476.) Hence, selecting the chief differential characters, the Solanacea are accumbent Primulosa, with mostly regular plicate corollæ and central placenta, i. e. Solanina, with a 2-celled baccate or capsular fruit, indefinite ovules, a curved embryo, and alternate leaves.

(4477.) The extent and the subordinate distribution of this type are far from being settled. Verbascum, which bas irregular flowers, Nolana, which has a deeply lobed ovarium, and Cestrum, in which the embryo, if curved, is so slightly bent as to be more properly described as straight, have been by some botanists excluded from the Solanaceae, and made the types of separate orders. Here, however, as in numerous similar cases, an intermediate course is chosen; and, without dissociating these really similar groups, they are distinguished from each other by being admitted as subtypes of a more general series.

(4478.) Hence Verbascum, Celsia, and Anthocercis, in which the corolla is not plaited in æstivation, and sometimes irregular, the stamens 5 and unequal, or even didynamous, and the embryo slightly curved, form the subtype Verbascida.

(4479.) In the aberrant genus, Nolana, which gives name to the subtype Nolanide, the corolla is regular and plaited in æstivation, the stamens equal to the petals in number, the ovarium deeply lobed, the fruit drupaceous, and the embryo arcuate.

(4480.) In the Solanide the corolla is usually plicate in æstivation, the stamens equal in number to its lobes, the fruit capsular or baccate, and the embryo much curved;

(4481.) While Cestrum, in which the embryo is straight, the corolla regular, the æstivation plicate, and the cotyledons foliaceous, is the normal genus of the proposed subtype Cestrida.

(4482.) The Solanaceæ form an interesting study, from the diversity of properties prevailing in the same natural group, and their very great apparent discrepancy. The discord is however apparent only, and it requires but little consideration to reconcile the seeming inconsistences; for, notwithstanding the deadly nightshade and the esculent potato, the acrid capsicum and the bland tomato, the wholesome egg-plant and the poisonous tobacco, with the stramonium, the henbane, the mandragora, and various other equally deleterious or equally innocuous plants, are found associated in the same natural order, they all afford evidence in favor of the doctrine of homomorphism, instead of being, as they at first appear, exceptions to the general rule-that plants having similar structures have similar properties likewise. The deleterious principles prevalent in the Solanacea are narcotics of a peculiar kind, and exercising a very singular and characteristic influence, especially over the pupil. Several of these principles

have been separated, and from the plants in which they are found (not exclusively yet) in the greatest relative proportions, they have been called Atropine, Solanine, Daturine, Hyoscyamine, &c.

(4483.) Experiments shew that even in the plants where these principles, which, when concentrated, are so noxious, the most abound, they seldom, if ever, occur in equal proportions in all parts; the root, the stem, the leaves, the fruit, or the seeds, are in turn its especial seat; while it is found less concentrated in the other parts, and occasionally from some altogether absent; or in such a condition or degree as to be easily dissipated by heat, or separable by other means. Instances of this kind have already been several times adverted to, such as the presence of opium in the seed-vessel, and its absence from the seeds of the poppy, the prevalence of prussic acid in the leaves, and not in the sarcocarp of the Lauro-cerasi ; in the spermoderm, but not in the nucleus of the bitter-almond; as well as the further instances of the production of the bland-nutritions Cassava, known to us as tapioca, the sick man's food, from the roots of the manihot, which in a raw state are deadly poisons.

(4484.) Now that which occurs thus notably in individual plants occurs still more remarkably in varieties, even of the same species, subjected to different external influences, and yet more decidedly in different species and genera of one natural group. Thus the same narcotic principle which is so deadly a poison when developed to excess in the Mandragora, Belladonna, and the Nightshade, is present in the potato, the tomato, and the egg-plant; but it is present in the latter in such small relative proportion to the inert or nutritious substances with which it is blended, as to be altogether innocuous, and not to prevent them being employed as food. In the common potato the narcotic principle is present in too large a proportion in the stems and leaves, and other parts exposed to light, to allow them to be used as human food; but the underground tubers, where exclusion from the light prevents its full elaboration, and where the vast deposits of fecula neutralize its effects, we find to be wholesome and nutritious. Furthermore, it must not be forgotten, that in all cases where we derive food from poisonous plants or suspected tribes, they are, as in the case of the tomato, the egg-plant, the potato, and the cassava, subjected to the action of fire before they are eaten, or, as is the case with the capsicum, taken in such small quantities as to be rather considered spices than food. De Candolle, when discoursing on this subject, observes, with his usual acuteness and discrimination, "it is a fact which should never be lost sight of, that all our aliments contain a small proportion of an exciting principle, which, should it occur in a much greater quantity, might become injurious, but which is necessary as a natural condiment," and that, when this stimulating principle is naturally in very small proportion, we increase it by art, or supply its place by the addition of spice.

(4485.) Bearing these data in mind, Fee bas proposed a classification of the Solanacea, according to the purposes to which they are applicable, these being dependant upon the relative proportions in which their active and inert principles are developed, so as to render them, on the one hand, esculent, and on the other, poisonous, which extremes may be connected by an intermediate series, the genera of which contain both poisonous and wholesome species.

(4486.) Thus, in his first group, which comprehends those genera all the species of which are dangerous or suspected plants, may be enumerated Atropa,

Mandragora, Hyoscyamus, Datura, Nicotiana, Solandra, Physalis, Nicandra, and Cestrum.

(4487.) To his second group, which contains those genera some of the species of which are poisonous and some innocuous, belong Solanum and Capsicum;

(4488.) While of his third, including those genera all the species of which are innocent, Lycopersicon, Celsia, Crescentia, and Verbascum, are given as examples. (4489.) VERBASCIDE. This subtype, which is evidently transitional from the preceding section to the present, shews its affinity to the Scrophulariacea, in which both Verbascum and Anthocercis are by some botanists associated, by the irregular corolla of the former, and the didynamous stamina both of Celsia and Anthocercis ; but their curved embryo and alternate leaves, perhaps, are characters of greater value, and locate them rather with the Solanacea; but the decision is not unquestionable. [§ 4475, c.]

(4490.) The Verbasca are shewy, and often handsome herbaceous plants, their leaves and stems covered with a thick beard or down, whence their name, which is said to be a corruption of Barbascum. This downy matter forms a thick woolly coat on the leaves of V. Lychnitis, the cuticle of which has been used as a substitute for tinder, and to make wicks for lamps, as referred to in its specific appellation. Morin says it contains a colouring matter, which has been employed for the purpose of dying cotton goods of a durable yellow, and tells us that an infusion of its flowers was formerly used by the Roman ladies to tinge their tresses of that reddish hue once so much admired in Italy. V. Blattaria is peculiarly offensive to cockroaches, and therefore, strewing its leaves about, is one of the means resorted to, to get rid of those troublesome insects. V. nigrum, the common mullien, is said to be slightly narcotic, and to be one of the plants used by poachers to intoxicate and capture fish.

(4491.) NOLANIDE. Nolana, by its usually deeply lobed ovarium, and especially by the fruit in one of the species, N. paradoxa, consisting of crowded drupeolæ, is a very aberrant genus. It appears to be equally related to the tetrakenious and subdrupaceous Menthacea on the one hand, and to the Convolvulace on the other; although its arcuate embryo and plaited corolla decide its strongest affinity to be with the solanaceous group.

(4492.) N. prostrata, which is a native of Peru, grows freely in this country in the open air. In France poultry are fed on it, and they are so fond of the plant, that Persoon proposed to call it N. gallinacea.

(4493.) SOLANIDE. This subtype has been separated into two districts, the one called Solanea, containing the baccate genera, and the other Datureæ, in which will be found those with capsular fruits.

(4494.) Daturea. The henbane, the tobacco, and the thorn-apple, with their offsets, Scopolia and Brugmansia, are the most important examples of this district. (4495.) Hyoscyamus niger is the common henbane. It is a powerful narcotic, and, when taken in any considerable quantity, proves quickly poisonous to men and most brute animals; swine are said to be able to feed on it with impunity, hence indeed its generic name; and goats and sheep will eat it, though sparingly, but no other animals, save two insects, a species of Cimer or bug, and Chrysomela or beetle, are known to resort to it as food.

The leaves are the parts usually employed in medicine, but the seeds are also

said to have similar narcotic properties. In the seeds, however, the soporific powers, if present, are most probably in a reduced degree, as Smith and Martyn state that they have eaten them without inconvenience: it must nevertheless be remembered, by those who desire to institute further experiments, that Lightfoot affirms, a few of them have deprived a man of his reason and of the use of his limbs. Pallas tells us that the seeds of H. Physalöides, when roasted and infused, make an excellent substitute for coffee; and Forskal says that in Arabia those of H. Datora are applied to a similar purpose, but he adds, the beverage thus prepared is valued by the Orientals chiefly for its intoxicating powers; so, whether these analogies confirm the account of Smith and Martyn respecting the allied species (niger), or whether the noxious principle, if present, may be dissipated in the one instance, and lessened in the other, by torrefaction, remains to be proved.

(4496.) In the south of Europe H. albus is used officinally instead of H. niger, merely because it is more common. The two species seem to differ very little, if at all, in their properties. The leaves are sometimes smoked to relieve toothach.

(4497.) One of the most powerful narcotics, and one of the most important plants in this group, in a commercial point of view, is the tobacco. There are about thirty species of Nicotiana, and some of these are natives, or naturalized in most parts of the world; for, although its use was unknown in Europe before the discovery of America, indulgence in its fumes is so common, nay, so universal among the Chinese, and the forms of their bamboo pipes and their methods of inhaling so peculiar, that Pallas and many others have been led to believe that the custom is aboriginal with them, and that they and other nations of the East were acquainted with its use before the discovery of the Western hemisphere. Two or more species, N. Sinensis and N. fruticosa, are also believed to be natives of China, and N. Nepalensis of Hindustan. Chardin states that its use was common in Persia long before the discovery of America, and that it is a native of that country, or at least was naturalized there as early as 1260. Furthermore, Liebault asserts that one species (his "petit tabac sauvage,") is a native of Europe, and that it was found wild in the forest of Ardennes previous to the discovery of the New World: this assertion seems, however, to be deficient in proof, and its correctness is doubted by most naturalists.

(4498.) All the species of Nicotiana possess the same, or nearly similar properties; but two only, N. Tabacum and N. rustica, are in much repute, or are much cultivated for use. The specific name, Tabacum, is not, as was long sup posed, a slight corruption of Tobago or Tobasco, whence the drug is brought, but is, as Humboldt has shewn, the Haytian word for the pipe in which it is smoked, and which has been transferred, like the term Mate [§ 1928], from the instrument to the herb.

(4499.) The history of tobacco is one of peculiar interest. It was first introduced into Europe about 1560, seeds being sent by Jean Nicot, from whom it derives its generic name, to Catherine de Medici; but it was not until 1586 that the use of the herb became generally known, and the practice of smoking introduced into England by Sir Walter Raleigh, and the settlers who returned from Virginia. Hariott, who accompanied the expedition which was sent out to attempt to found a colony in Virginia, gives, along with a description of the tobacco