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THE FUNGUS FOEAT. 



October, 1883. 



This is the sixteenth year of the fungus forays of the Woolhope Club. The first 

 one of which we can find any account was held in the October of 1868, since which 

 time they have been continued without interruption. For some time after they 

 were instituted the forays of this Club were unique ; they were not fashionable, 

 however successful they might have been, and no Society followed the example. 

 When, however, the Woolhope Club came to be celebrated for its fungus forays 

 and their repute floated abroad through the continent of Europe, other societies 

 were inspired with a desire to emulate the Hereford Club, and gradually of late 

 years fungus forays have sprung up in all directions. If imitation be the sincerest 

 of flattery, then the Woolhope Club has been flattered, for it certainly has been 

 imitated, with some amount of success, although not with equal success, because 

 the plan has been so modified that in most instances the " imitatiDU forays " have 

 only been imitations. The whole method has only been followed by the Crypto- 

 gamic Society of Scotland and the Botanical Society of France, but the latter 

 only attempted the forays for about two years, and then they ceased altogether. 



The characteristic features of the Woolhope forays consist in bringing toge- 

 ther, by invitation, all the principal botanists who devote themselves to the study 

 of fungi for a week's holiday, four consecutive days being devoted to excursions 

 in neighbouring woods in search of fungi during the day, and in the evening or 

 early morning the specimens are examined and determined, and papers read on 

 mycological subjects. The objects, therefore, which the Woolhope Club keep in 

 view are to bring together the students of fungi, for social intercourse and ex- 

 change of ideas, from all parts of the coimtry, to organise for them excursions on 

 four consecutive days for the purpose of collecting specimens, to provide for them 

 a large room in which to deposit and arrange the fungi for exhibition, to enter- 

 tain visitors from a distance, to provide a canversazione for each evening where all 

 the excursionists may meet and read or hear papers on kindred topics ; and 

 finally, a public dinner : all these objects being most successfully accomplished. 



The forays which have of late years been organised by some half dozen socie- 

 ties have been much less ambitious. These forays are limited to a single day, or in 

 most cases to the latter half of one day, and therefore, if that proves to be a wet 

 one, a complete damper is put on the foray for the year ; but when the forays ex- 

 > tend over three or four days, it is most probable that if some days are wet, there 

 will be one or two dry ones for a change, and the foray in the end has its object 

 achieved. Under these circumstances it is scarcely too much to claim for the Here- 

 ford gatherings that, in spite of imitations, the genuine article remains unique. 



During the first week in October the sixteenth annual forays of the Woolhope 

 Club have been held, and in results are behind none of their predecessors, thanks 

 to the presiding genius, who has undertaken all the labour and responsibility of 

 arranging the entire series from the first to the la,»t. 



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