Order Hymenomycetes. Tribe Pileati. 



Plate XLIX. 



AGARICUS PSITTACINUS, &/.^/.. 



Farroqiiet Agaric. 



Series Leucospobus. 



Sub-genus Clitocybe. Sub-division Hygbocybe.' 



Spec. Char. A. Psittacinus. Pileus one inch broad, conical, campanulate, at lengtli expanded, sometimes 

 concave from the margin tui'uing up, smooth, ghitinoiis, striate when moist, gi'eeu at first, changing to yellow of 

 various shades, sometimes tinted with lake red, often cracking. Gills slightly adnate, rather distant, broad in the 

 centre, bright yellow often shaded with green. Stem from two to three inches high, about two lines thick, hollow, 

 splitting, green, yellow at the base, very shiny. 



Agaricus psittacinus, Seheeffer, Fries, Berhdey, Grevilh, Sowerhj, TFitltering. 

 chamaeleo, BulUard. 



In pastures and parks ; October and November. Common. 



" The green colour here seems, as in the A. (vruginosus, to be contained in the slimy coating, wliicli 

 being laid on a golden ground, acquires sucli an unusual brilliancy. It wears or washes from the central 

 and projecting part of the pileus, and then shews the yellow ground, but it remains longest on the upper 

 part of the stem, because there protected by the shelter the pileus affords." It would not be easy to 

 amend Withering's graphic description and therefore we offer it as it stands. Some years ago, when 

 wandering through Knowle park, the turf was so completely sprinkled with these Httle gems of funguses, 

 that it would scarcely have been possible to find a square yard of it which did not exliibit several ; they are 

 not lovers of umbrage, like many other Agarics, but prefer open sites, seldom growing mider trees. This 

 Agaric is of no use whatever, that we can recommend it for, neither does it possess deleterious qualities to 

 be warned against, as far as our own experience goes. No attempt has been gastronomically made upon it 

 at Hayes ; in fact there is so little to say on the subject, that the bringing it forward at all seems to need tlie 

 only excuse that perhaps mother nature can offer for its existence — " it is very pretty," and this we beheve 

 every one wiU acknowledge whose attention is once directed to it ; but it prefers that damp autumnal state 

 of tilings, when the heavy half freezing dews never rise from the grass all day, when the weather is very 

 questionable, when a lady's gown may be better employed than in sweeping up dead leaves, and her foot 



' Prom lypos moid, and kv^tj a head. Pileus thin, viscid when moist ; stem hollow. 



