Good Poisons One of the better known gardens for the
production of Rock Garden plants has been given up largely to the growing of Belladonna. Poison is substituted for beauty : such is the influence of war, even on gardens Happily the poison in question is to be used for medicinal purposes. A neighbouring garden was given up during the previous war to that most obviously poisonous of plants, the wild henbane. For what reason I do not know, but this weed is not now needed, which in this case is a pity, for the plant after a complete disappearance for over twenty years has surprisingly reappeared. Have the seeds lain dormant all this time? A great number of herbs of course are becoming more and more precious and are well worth cultivating. The hedges and waste places near these two gardens are today conspicuous, not with the true belladonna, but with its cousin the woody nightshade, whose berries, thought to be peculiarly poisonous by the country folk, are a favourite food of the pheasant. On one dump the pheasants gorged both on these berries and on the equally red fruit of the tomatoes, which had sown themselves in quantity in the refuse.
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