28 An HISTORY of AGARICS, 



XXIX. AGARICUS Jlipitatus, pileo craffo hemifpbertco Jabluteo "cifcido, 

 (kjhantinus. Ittmellis trijidis crajjis j'ragilis fabalbidis, Jiipite albo crajfo 



fpongicfo. 



ELEPHANT AGARIC. 



TAB. XXVIII. 



T^HE root confifts of a few fibers, which ifiue from the 

 A bottom of the item : there is no volva. 



The ftem is upright, folid, large, and of a fair white co- 

 lour ; it is fix inches in circumference ; and about four inches 

 high ; the fubftance is foft, fpongy, and eafily comprefiible ; the 

 figure approaches to an oval, being broadeft in the middle, and 

 narrow above and below. When the plant grows old, the ftem 

 becomes cylindrical, hard, of a dark colour, and hollow within: 

 it has no annulus or curtain. 



The gills are arranged in three ferie?, they are deep, remote, 

 extremely grofs, (being a line in thicknefs) brittle, and appear 

 like wax of a very pale kind of whitifh tallow colour. 



The pileus, at its firft appearance, is globular, and inwraps 

 the whole of the plant, except the radical fibres : for its margin 

 or rim furrounds and embraces the bottom of the ftem, and by 

 this means ferves the fame purpofe as a volva in fome other 

 Agarics ; afterwards it acquires an hemiipherical figure, is 

 covered with a vifcid liquor, and is of a yellowifh clay colour. 

 In decay the pileus becomes irregularly horizontal, lacerates, 

 becomes dry, changes to dark colours of various hues, and feems 

 as if a considerable degree of fire had palled upon it. 



Grows in the dry part of woods about Halifax, in October, 

 and, if the feafon is dry, abides feveral weeks in the ftate re- 

 prefented in the upper figure, plate 28. 



