the facts are that muscarine is seldom if ever fatal, that 
it is destroyed by cooking, and that it exists in 4. mus- 
caria only in traces. One would have to eat kilograms 
of fresh A. muscaria to induce a muscarine reaction, and 
far more for a lethal dose. In the English-speaking 
world this spectacular mushroom labors under a tabu, 
originally I believe religious, which wielded such power 
that it seeped out and infected the whole wild mushroom 
world—the world of ‘toadstools’—to the point where 
the idea of eating them strikes panic into the normal 
Knglishman’s being, be he ever so brave. The victim (or 
beneficiary) of 4. muscaria, following a stupor accom- 
panied perhaps by vivid dreams, is traditionally imbued 
with a sense of exhilaration, of living in new dimensions 
with miraculous mobility; but these are the result of 
drugs new to science and now for the first time being 
studied. 
Of the remaining toxic mushrooms, there is a peculiar 
mystery about Gyromitra esculenta, a common species 
much eaten (as its name suggests) in central Kurope. 
Certain it is that at intervals cases occur where an indi- 
vidual dies from this species. The explanation may not 
be surely known, but if the best opinion available today 
proves right, Gyromitra esculenta offers us a notable 
fungal peculiarity. It seems that everyone may eat this 
tasty mushroom with impunity for the first time. But 
occasionally there is an individual who, if he returns to 
a mess of the same species shortly thereafter, and if the 
mushrooms are fresh rather than dried, suffers a danger- 
ous or even fatal anaphylactic shock. 
Dorothy L. Sayers with Robert Eustace in The Docu- 
ments in the Case produced the supreme example in King- 
lish of a mystery story based on fungal poisoning. An 
eccentric Englishman, George Harrison, made wild 
mushrooms his hobby (he was obviously eccentric), and 
[ 104 | 
