14 ON THE ECONOMIC USE OF FUNGI. 



great manj different species, is eaten in the various countries of 

 Europe. In many localities, particularly in forest regions, tlie 

 peasantry look upon Fungi as furnishing a most important item of 

 daily food, while the gathering of certain choice sorts for market 

 affords profitable employment. The titles of " manna of the 

 poor," "fruits of the earth," etc., as applied to Fungi, have in 

 such countries no fanciful meaning. They are, at any rate, more 

 strictly suitable than " food of the gods," -which was how the 

 ancient Greeks loved to extol their favourite mushrooms. 



In England the pasture Pratelles are the only kind of mushroom 

 popularly and generally considered eatable. All others are sup- 

 posed to be more or less noxious. Doubtless some readers of this 

 will be surprised to learn how much wider is the consumption of 

 Fungi in other countries. In many of the chief cities of the 

 Continent mushrooms are excisable commodities, and inspectors 

 are appointed to overlook the market and watch that no dele- 

 terious species should accidentally be admitted. During recent 

 years much attention has been paid in England to the cultivation 

 of a variety of the pasture Pratelle. There is now a considerable 

 demand for it, and the occupation of growing it for market is very 

 lucrative. One may hope, from this, that the old prejudice against 

 other sorts of Fungi will in time be weakened. 



Doubtless we have a few more or less ardent mycophagists — 

 fungus-eaters — scattered about the country, who make use of one 

 kind and another to a small extent. Foreigners, too, appear to 

 have introduced a usage of certain species in some localities. 

 Truffles are, or were, collected about the New Forest ; the Morel 

 has some friends in Northamptonshii-e, Hertfordshire, and Dur- 

 ham; the Blewit is favoured in Cambridgeshire; the Oread in 

 Kent and Sussex; and the so-called Red Truffle in the vicinity 

 of liath. In excui'sions round London the author has often met 

 French, Germans, Swiss, and Italians, probably waiters and the 

 like, out for a holiday, who were filling their handkerchiefs with 

 fungus dainties to carry home for supper. 



Thnjughout the countries of Europe there are upwards of two 

 hundred species of Fungi commonly used for food in various ways. 

 Fx-ance, Germany, Austria, and Russia appear to consume them 

 most abundantly ; then come Italy, Switzerland ; and after them 

 the remaining countries. The greater number of these edibles 

 occur in England also, whei-e they are suffered to rot where they 

 grow year by year. 



