342 THE AGARICACEAE OF MICHIGAN 



at times. The plants are sometimes deformed by a fungous para- 

 site, Mycogone rosea, causing the gills to remain sterile. It has been 

 found in several states, but is apparently rare. 



324. Cortinarius caesiocyaneus Britz. (Edible) 



Bot. Centralbl., 1895, p. 10, 1899, p. 58. 



Maire, Bull, de la. Soc. Myc. de France, 26, 1910. 



Illustrations : Maire, Bull. de. la. Soc. Myc. de France, Vol. 26, 

 PI. 8, Fig. 1-2. 



PILEUS 5-12 cm. broad, convex then expanded-plane, sometimes 

 depressed on the center, bluish-violaceous-white to silvery -violaceous, 

 glabrous, even, with a viscid, separable 'pellicle, silky-shining when 

 dry, margin becoming silky and at first incurved. FLESH pale 

 violet, fading slowly, thick. GILLS rather narrow, adnexed, 

 rounded behind then sinuate, thin, pale violaceous, soon pale aluta- 

 ceous, then cinnamon, crowded, edge even or becoming eroded. STEM 

 stout, 4-7 cm. long, 1-2 cm. thick, solid, pale violaceous-white, con- 

 color within, equal above the large, flattened, marginate-depressed 

 bulb, which is white on the surface from the white universal veil, 

 attached to white mycelium. CORTINA violaceous-white. Spores 

 10-12 (rarely 13) x 6-7 micr., almond-shaped, elliptical, tuberculate, 

 cinnamon in mass. ODOR and TASTE mild. 



Gregarious or subcaespitose. On the ground among leaves in 

 frondose woods of oak, maple, etc. Aim Arbor. September-October. 

 Infrequent. 



This is a segregate of G. caerulesccns Fr. The whole plant has a 

 rather uniform pale violaceous-whitish color almost exactly like 

 G. michiganensis. As in that species, the gills are not at first 

 intensely colored nor at all purple or rosy. It has the large size of 

 G. atkinsonianus with which it sometimes occurs. The flattened 

 bull) is while below and on the sides, where it is clothed by the 

 white subgelatinous veil. The spores are larger thau in G. michi- 

 ganensis with which it is easily confused and which belongs to 

 another section. Cooke's figures of G. caerulescens (111., PI. 721) 

 show the stature and color, but not the characteristic bulb and 

 spores; that plate is referred by Maire (Bull, de la Soc. Myc. de 

 France, Vol. 2(J, p. 18) to G. caesiocyaneus Britz. Ricken places 

 this plant under G. camphoratus Fr. but without any good grounds. 



