luxuriant and juicy specimens. Corda describes some of wliich the stem often reaches twelve inches in 

 height ! and we presume the other parts are in proportion. He also distinguishes two forms of the Agaric, 

 that wliich is most common in Italy being the rarer of the two in Germany : these appear to have no 

 essential diiTerence ; the Italian fungus is entirely snow-white, turning brownish where rubbed and handled, 

 with most peculiar " icicle-like " warts ; the German variety is only slightly scaly, upon a silky, brownish 

 epidermis ; both agree in the characters of the stem, ring, flesh, gills, &c. ; with regard to the latter 

 feature, " although often appearing to be truly forked they are not really so, it is merely a partial adhesion ; 

 the dimidiate gills are cut off vertically, and between them and the long ones are yet smaller, generally of a 

 tooth-hke form." The concentric " hosing " upon the stem exactly resembles one species of A. anensis ; 

 like that too the ring is a delicate membrane, clothed externally with the floccose prolongation of the fleecy 

 hose ; but the two Agarics can never be confounded with each other, as the Lepiote A. FittacUni has un- 

 changeably pale giHs and white spores ; the Cortinarious A. arvensis, from flesh-colour to purple gills and 

 dark-brown spores. 



When eaten dried in small quantities this Agaric caused irritation and heat in the throat, fiuslnng heat 

 in the whole lody, and giddiness ; in large doses the effect does not appear to have been ascertained ; the 

 minor experiment having evidently been deemed sufficient; but when people swallow a suspicious article 

 to watch the effect of it upon themselves, the nervous excitement might cause the symptoms described ; the 

 Agaric might be innocent ; " a woman who ate an ounce and half fresh, broiled with butter, felt no effect 

 therefrom ; " we only trust the Paulets of Germany do not substitute the weaker sex for dogs in their 

 experiments ! it is a suspicious statement. 



