PSILOCYBE. 363 



PSILOCYBE. Fries, (figs. 11, 12, p. 351.) 



Pilens more or less fleshy, smooth, margin at first incurved ; 

 gills and spores at length brownish or purplish ; stem 

 central, rather cartilaginous, rigid or tough, tubular, tube 

 either hollow or stuiFed, often rooting. Veil absent or 

 rudimentary, never interwoven to form a membrane. 



Psilocybe (as a subgenus of Agaricus), Fries, Syst. Myc. i. 

 p. 289 ; Cke., Hdbk., p. 207. 



Distinguished from Psathyra by the margin of the pileus 

 being at first incurved, and from Agaricus and Stropharia, 

 which some of the species resemble, by the absence of a 

 ring. 



Psilocybe is analogous to Naucoria, Leptonia and Collyhia. 



Pileus glabrous, veil either absent (or in a few species 

 that grow on dung, very fugacious). Distinguished from 

 Psathyra by the margin of the pileus being incurved at first. 

 Stem almost cartilaginous, and in this respect corresponding 

 with Collyhia and Naucoria rather than Clitocyhe. In the 

 present genus there are two primary divisions characterised 

 by being tough or fragile. These are connected by species 

 having the pileus innately fibrillose. Almost all the species 

 are terrestrial, gregarious, often caespitose, inodorous, not 

 edible. (Fries.) 



ANALYSIS OF TEE SPECIES. 



I. Tenaces. — Veil accidental, rarely conspicuous. Pileus 

 with a pellicle, often rather viscid in damp weather, becom- 

 ing pale. Colour of pileus clear, bright. Stem firm, flexile, 

 often coloured. 



* Gills ventricose, not decurrent. 



** Gills plane, very broad behind, subdecurrent. ( = Sub- 

 gen. Decornica of W. G. Smith.) 



*** Gills almost linear, ascending, 



II. EiGiDi. — Veil absent. Pileus scarcely pelliculose, but 

 the flesh frequently splitting, hygrophanous. Gills adnexed, 

 very rarely adnate. Stem rigid. 



