Health and Woodland Medicine 329 



by mice or squirrels is usually good. References to the 

 article on toadstools will show that none but the Amanitas 

 are deadly, and these are well known by their white or 

 yellow gills, their parasol shape, the ring on their upper 

 stem, and the cup out of which they spring. They grow 

 on the ground in the woods. 



Lichens. But the surest food supply of all is that from 

 the lowly lichens, which exist in enormous quantities 

 throughout the great land of big hunger and little sticks. 

 Doctor C. C. Curtis says: 



"All lichens are rich in carbohydrates; lichen starch or 

 lichenin, constituting 40 to 60 per cent, of the bulk of 

 the higher forms." 



They supply winter food to all the northern quadrupeds. 

 The reindeer, the white hare, the musk-ox, and the lemming 

 find in them their chief support; and those which do not 

 live directly on the hchen do so indirectly by preying on 

 those who do. 



They are not choice dainties for human food. But 

 Richardson, the famous northern naturaHst, and the party 

 with him, as well as unnumbered Eskimos and travelers, 

 have lived for weeks on the lichens when other food has 

 failed. 



The kinds most useful are the Iceland moss {Cetraria 

 icelandica), the reindeer moss {Cladonia rangiferina) , and 

 the rock-tripe or famine-food {Umbilicaria arctica), and 

 other species. To these we might add the Lucanora 

 esculenta or manna lichen, the manna of the Bible; but as 

 this is an old-world species it is not within the intended 

 scope of this article. 



The Iceland moss is a rigid, erect, branching moss, almost 

 like a seaweed, and of brown color. It abounds in 

 most northern latitudes. Richardson speaks of the Barren 

 Grounds being covered with Cetraria of two species. When 



