202 CLAVIS AGARICINORUM. 



then expanded, not decidedly fleshy ; stem distinct from the hymeno- 

 phorum,* ringed or ringless, furnished with a volva, free and lax, connate 

 with the base, or friable and nearly obsolete ; gills free from tiie stem. 

 — Hab. On the ground, mostly in woods and uncultivated places. 



This subgenus is remarkable for the great development of the veil, 

 which at first entirely envelopes the young plant in a thick clothy 

 wrapper ; as the fungus reaches maturity, the veil is naturally ruptured, 

 and part of it remains in scattered and easily removed patches on the 

 pileus (b), and part foi'ms a more or less complete cup or volva at the 

 base (c) ; when there are no fragments on the pileus, the veil has 

 been ruptured in one place, where the whole mass remains ; this is 

 often the case in Agaricus phalloides, Fr. Some of the species have 

 the stem furnished with a ring (d), which is part of the veil, whilst three 

 species are ringless (or more properly, the ring is adherent to the stem). 

 In some species the veil is thick and greatly developed, whilst in others 

 it is thin and friable, and both volva and patches are evanescent ; the 

 higher forms of Amanita stand alone ; from the stem being fui'nished 

 with a volva and ritig. Some of the species are edible, others highly 

 poisonous. 



Amanita corresponds with the pink-spored Fulvaria, Plate II. fig. 

 10. The species figured is Agaricus (Amanita) muscarius, L., spores 

 •00032" X -00025". 



Subgenus 2. Lepiota, Fr. Syst. Myc. vol. i. p. 19 (Plate I. fig. 2). 

 — Veil universal, and concrete with the cuticle of the pileus breaking 

 up in the form of scales (f) ; pileus never compact, often very thin, the 

 flesh always soft and threadlike, and not only distinct from the stem, 

 but often separated above into a peculiar cup ; stem distinct from the 

 hymenophorum,* generally hollow, full of threadlike fibres, rather sub- 

 cartilaginous than fleshy, different in texture from the flesh of the 

 pileus (hence it is easily removed, leaving a cup or socket at its point 

 of juncture with the pileus e), furnished with an annulus, which is at 

 first continuous with the cuticle of the pileus, often moveable, some- 



* Some exceptions may be found to nearly every character amongst Agarics, 

 and tliis one of a free hymenophorum has two exceptions, one in a variety of 

 Agaricus (Lepiota) granulosus, Batscli, where the gills are adnafe (or even have 

 a decun-cnt tooth), and the other in an Amanita whieli I have described under 

 the name of Agaricus adnaius, where the same condition obtains. The pre- 

 sence of the annulus, too, is not without exception ; it is often fugitive, and 

 must then be souglit for in young specimens ; and it is sometimes absent from 

 the first in Agaricus (Arinillaria) melleus, Vahl. 



