96 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



skin is filled with a substance, white, yellowish, puq^le, or black. If 

 old, the contents are discharged in dust at a smart squeeze. It is a 

 Puff-ball. 



As the object of this article is to interest thosd having no knoAvl- 

 edge whatever of the subject, I shall not allude to other families. It 

 is probable that your toadstool will come within one of these four 

 grand divisions. If not, select another at once. 



The puff-balls are the safest mushrooms for the beginner. When 

 you find one, with a smooth skin, perfectly white inside, it is the giant 

 puff-ball {Ly coper dum giganteum) in an infantile state. The color of 

 the skin varies from pure white to a shade almost black. If the knife 

 leaves a stain of yellow, it is too old to eat. Otherwise, you may eat 

 it without fear. There are several smaller varieties, which my wife 

 and I eat indiscriminately. 



I believe all white puff-balls may be safely used if cooked at once. 

 They change very rapidly after gathering, and should only be eaten 

 in their freshest state. There is no poisonous fungus resembling 

 them. 



The teeth-bearing toadstools are also safe fungi for the experi- 

 ments of the amateur. I have found only one variety, but Smith says 

 all the species of any size enjoy a good character. The spreading 

 hydnum [Hydnum repandum) is usually yellow, sometimes reddish, 

 always firm-fleshed; stem deformed, indistinct, or eccentric; and one 

 side of the disk, or top, is frequently much higher than the point 

 diametrically opposite. The peculiarity of the teeth, or spines (which 

 in young specimens easily rub off), is enough to distinguish it. 



The Holeti can only be confounded with their twin brothers, the 

 JPolyporei. The latter grow mostly on wood, with abortive stems, 

 while the boletus of the edible kind grows from the ground, has a 

 distinct stem, and the tubes of the sponge are easily separable from 

 each other. If these tubes or pores are brown, yellowish, or green- 

 ish, the top being russet-color, or any shade of brown, and on cutting 

 the flesh it remains white, it is an edible, or at least a harmless, variety. 

 If the plant is brilliant-colored, red or yellow, or turns blue when 

 bruised, it is best to reject it. If the tubes are red at the orifice, it is 

 doubtless poisonous. 



The Agarlcini (those with gills) cannot be thus generalized, and I 

 regard them as the least safe for the amateur, although it is to this 

 class that the celebrated individual honored by English-speaking 

 people with the title of " a mushroom " belongs. How can I describe 

 this species, it varies so widely with its circumstances? 



Two varieties, the meadow-mushroom [Agarimts campestris) and 

 the horse-mushroom [Agaricits arvensis), run into each other by inter- 

 mediate types so closely that professional cooks and gardeners may 

 be forgiven that they entirely ignore any difference between them. 

 There is a theory that the horse-mushroom is propagated from spores 



