I 8 BRITISH EDIBLE FUNGI. 



being prepared in the same manner. There is as 

 much art in cooking a fungus as in selecting one for 

 that purpose, although it is an art which, in both 

 cases, may be readily acquired. 



If popular prejudice has, on the one hand, limited 

 the number of edible species to its lowest quantity, it 

 has, on the other hand, proportionately increased the 

 number of dangerous species to an alarming extent. 

 It was undoubtedly the prevailing opinion, not many 

 years ago, that every fungus was poisonous which was 

 not a veritable " mushroom." The lowest estimate 

 we can give of the number of species of gill-bearing 

 fungi, of the mushroom type, which have been found 

 in the British Islands, is eleven hundred, and yet of 

 these there are comparatively few which are known 

 to be positively dangerous. It is true that those 

 which are known are, for the most part, very virulent, 

 yet the number cannot be demonstrated to reach one 

 hundred. There are others, of course, which are 

 tasteless, insipid, bitter, or unpleasant, and unfit for 

 food, although not absolutely poisonous ; but the 

 most alarming estimates have no foundation in fact. 

 It must always be remembered that a fungus which 

 may be perfectly harmless if cooked and eaten whilst 

 fresh would just as probably be deleterious if gathered 

 and kept for a day or two, without cooking. Chemi- 

 cal changes take place so rapidly that they cannot 

 be cooked too soon, and not even the common mush- 

 room should be kept longer than possible. It would 



