. So much was
claimed by ancient doctors for the Black Hellebore as a medicine in
mania, epilepsy, dropsy, and other ills to which mortals are heirs, that
naturally the true plant was sought with much zeal. Dr. Woodville
laments the want of proper descriptions of plants and the consequences,
and in his "Botany," p. 51, points out some ridiculous errors made in
reference to the Black Hellebore previous to 1790; he gives the names of
many plants which had been mistaken for it and actually employed, and he
assumes that at the time of his writing all such errors had not only
been discovered, but corrected, by what he then described as, and we now
call by the name of, _H. niger_, being the true Black Hellebore; and
after all, the potent herb of the ancients has been identified in a
plant (a near relation, it is true) other than the white Christmas
Rose--it may be some time before we come to think of our present subject
as the true Black Hellebore, especially when an otherwise popular
species bears the name.

Cultivation, as for _H. niger_.

Flowering period, December to April.

Helleborus Purpurascens.

PURPLISH HELLEBORE; _Nat. Ord._ RANUNCULACEAE.

A native of Podolia and Hungary, introduced sixty to seventy years ago.
It belongs to the section whose flowers appear before the root leaves,
having branched flower stalks and the cut floral leaf. It is a dwarf
kind, and varies very much; I have now an established specimen in bloom
at the height of 3in., and others at 8in. or 9in. It also differs in the
depth of bloom-colour; some of its flowers may be described as
purplish-green and others as greenish-purple, slaty and dove-coloured;
others have a tinge of red more visible. The flowers are few, on
twice-forked stems, are 2in. or more across, and commonly, as the name
implies, of a purplish colour; the inner surface of the sepals is a
slaty shade, the purple prevailing on the outer surface; the form of the
flower is nearly round and slightly cupped, from the nearly round or
kidney shaped sepals, which neatly overlap each other, and are also
incurved at the edges; the petals are very short and green; the stamens
and anthers of a creamy white; the floral leaf is nearly stalkless;
segments unevenly toothed. The radical leaves are "pubescent on the
under surface, palmate, with the segments cuneated at the base, and from
three to five lobed at the apex." The habit is robust and free blooming;
the flowers slightly droop