This section is from the book "Wild Flowers Every Child Should Know", by Frederic William Stack. Also available from Amazon: Wild flowers every child should know.
This pretty Nightshade has been classed among the principal poisonous plants of our country, but it is far from being the treacherous and violent sort with which it has often been associated in folk-lore. It is not of the Poison Ivy sort, and can be handled with impunity in this respect. At the same time one should refrain from testing its effects upon the system. It should not be held in the mouth nor chewed, neither should the berries be eaten, as some ill effects have been caused thereby. It is rather common in moist thickets and along damp, shady roadsides, streams and ditches, from May to September. The smooth or finely-haired, green stalk grows from two to eight feet in length, and is perennial. It is branched, straggling and climbing, and has a rank, coarse odour. The thin, alternating, dark green, toothless leaves taper toward the tip and are set on slender stems. The lower ones are usually heart-shaped while the upper ones are deeply cut at the base into two narrow, flaring lobes or wings with pointed tips. The veinings show on the under side, and the midrib is coarse. The surface is frequently marked with irregular, pale rusty spots. The enticing, yellowcentred, purple flowers have a star-shaped corolla, and are set in a small, green, five-parted, bell-shaped calyx. They hang gracefully on their curved stemlets in small. loose, spreading and nodding clusters, from a slender stem which springs from the axils of the leaves. The five deeply cleft and pointed segments of the corolla are prettily recurved, and at the base of each there are two green spots. The five yellow stamens project with their anthers united in the form of a cone. The bright red berries form very attractive drooping clusters in the fall. Nightshade is found from New Brunswick to Minnesota, and south to North Carolina and Kansas. The plant has a peculiar juice which is at first sweetish to the taste, then soon becoming bitter and it has also some medicinal qualities. It is related to the potato, tomato and egg-plant of our gardens, and is naturalized from Europe.
 
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