CLASSIFICATION OF AGARICS 17; 



bo that they appear decurrent, even in those cases where they were 

 merely adnate or adnexed a1 first. ^^' i i h age, the margin of t in- 

 [(ileus heroines recurved or split The surface is viw id or glotino 

 in many cases, others are hygrophanons, bu1 those of one subgenus 

 include some with n dry pileus; n small Dumber have minute 

 squamules over the surface or on the disk. A greal variety of col 

 ors is present ; white, yellow, orange, red, green, ashy, brown, etc. 

 Borne have ;i striate margin, and others are even and glabrous. The 

 FLESH is usually soft, mid somewhat waxy or watery, often per- 

 meated by differentiated lactiferous hyphae or crystals of oral 

 of lime. The GILLS are peculiar in structure, and furnish the 

 main characters by which we separate the genus. Their edges are 

 acute, inn they gradually thicken towards their attachment with 

 the pileus, so as to bo narrowly triangular in cross-section. The 

 hymenial layer becomes soft when mature and rubs oil' from the 

 trama proper of the gills, Leaving the skeleton of trama behind. 

 They are mostly subdistant to distant or very distant, and this 

 character, along with the waxy consistency and their shape in 

 tion. constitutes a set of marks by which, after a little experience, 

 one can tell the genus. As Mcllvaine says. "There is an indescrib- 

 able, w.itny. waxy, translucent appearance about the gills, which 

 catches the eye of the expert, and is soon learned by the novice." 

 Their attachment varies from adnexed to adnate and decurrent. 

 They arc 1 usually white, hut may he similar in color to that of the 

 pileus. The interspaces are often veined iu a marked fashion. 

 The STEM is central and similar in texture to the pileus. often very 

 fragile or watery. It is either solid or if it is stuffed becomes 

 quickly hollow. It often splits longitudinally with considerable 

 ease. In the subgenus Limacium, the plant when young is some- 

 times enveloped by a slimy universal veil which breaks op into 

 glutinous patches, scales or flocci on the stem or pileus, or bj a 

 partial floccose veil which is connected to the margin of the pileus 

 ami t<> the stem; as the plant expands or dries this partial veil 

 breaks up into a floCCOSe annulus <"' more often in the form of 



scabrous <"■ punctate flocci :n the apex of the stem. The plants of 

 the other two subgenera do not possess either ( .f these veils, hut 



those species which are viscid develop this character from the cut- 

 ide of the pileus or stem which is gelatinous and which disso 

 into a slimy substance in moist weather, as in //. psittioinus. The 

 SPORES may he subglobose, oval, oblong, cylindrical or ellipti 

 Pries (Hymen. Europ), speaks of them as "globose" only, and 

 Patouillard says they are ovoid. DeSeynes l ^nn. 9 

 Ser. 5, 1 (1864) Tab. in. Fig. :;. | figures the H. 



