Hellebore

Alongside the paths grows a plant whose name, at least, is known to all those who remember La Fontaine's fable of the Hare and the Tortoise: “Pray take, your senses to restore / A grain or two of hellebore”. Hellebore, also known as dungwort, is toxic – but it does not cure madness as popular belief had it. This member of the buttercup family is evergreen and can be identified in winter by its pale green leaves, which are spear-shaped and palmately lobed. […] Its pale green flower stalk has bracts and dies after flowering; it appears in February to March. It is embellished with five greenish petals with a red edge and ten petals of a rather unpleasant nectary shape. Shepherds hung it in sheepfolds and used it to treat abscesses and sheep scab. (Nelly Bernard)