Order Hymenomycetes. Tribe Pileati. 



Plate XXXII. 



AGARICUS LEPIDUS, i^n.. 



Dainty Agaric. 

 Series Leucosporus. Subgenus Russula. 



Spec. Char. Agaricus lepidl's. Pileus from two to three inches across, irregular from the compression of the 

 soil, grass, roots, &c. ; at first convex, then slightly depressed in the centre, dry, opake, dull, variegated with 

 sanguine-red, pallid at the centre, where it is generally rimoso-squamose ; [margin patent, obtuse, destitute of 

 stria. Gills roimded in front, rather branched, much forked, cream-white. Stem solid, compact, smooth, white, 

 with a beautifid roseate flush. Flesh extremely firm, crisp, and brittle. Perfectly mild, esculent, excellent. 

 Russula lepida, Tries. 



Hah. Under tall trees, oaks at Hayes Eector\', beech according to Fries ; in dry situations. Summer. 



The " fatal red colour/' wliicli Fries says has " seduced " autliorities into mistakes respecting the 

 varieties of Russula, indirectly determines for us, in this case, a most valuable species ; not that shades and 

 tinges of changeable sanguine intensity, more or less purple, more or less scarlet, could ever be described 

 for the unfailing guidance of students who, perhaps, have not even the optical power of distinguishing 

 colours, but because, in the case of A. lepidus, the hue which was red when growing, and more particularly 

 that dehcate flush which pervades portions of the stem, comes out of the tourtiere bright verdigris-green ! 

 The loss of the roseate stains we could have understood, under the influence of heat, &c., but not the 

 acquisition of the antagonistic colour. Yet so it is ; and as no other Russula, nor indeed any red Agaric 

 that we are aware of, undergoes a similar change, it must be considered a peculiar characteristic. 



The subdivision of Fries, Rigidce, is well exemplified in this species, for although so brittle that it is 

 scarcely possible to extricate the pileus from the turf without breaking it, it is very crisp. The flesh is 

 exactly the reverse of succulent, and the stem resembles in internal texture, when broken across, one of 

 the frothy sticks of peppermint lollipop, of which the technical name has escaped oiu* memory. A. lepulus 

 grows scattered about in twos and threes, often united at the base ; it comes after summer electric rains, 

 wiiile the ground is yet unsoftened ; and wonderful it is to see the way in which the stem pushes up the 

 pileus through all obstacles, so that the poor Agaric, if not absolutely lea\'ing part of the brim of its hat 

 bent into the ground, and cracked away from the centre, is always irregularly developed, and fractured, in 

 the contest to overcome the difficulties in the way of its expansion. Within a few yards of the dry old 

 woodland slope where annually we find a valuable harvest of A. lepidus, a crop of A. rosaceus, of Fries, 

 constantly succeeds them. Seldom are the two growing at one period : if so, the acrid, viscid, but beautiful 

 empoisonneur is in a damper situation; still the danger would be great of unskilled judgment pro- 



