FUNGI. 
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Poisonous Mushrooms. 
1. Grow in clusters, in woods, and dark damp places. 
2. Usually with bright colours. 
3. Flesh tough, soft, and watery. 
4, Acquire a brown, green, or blue tint, when cut and exposed to the air. 
5. Juice often milky. 
6. Odour commonly powerful and disagreeable. 
7. Have an acrid, astringent, acid, salt, or bitter taste. 
All Fungi should be avoided which insects will not touch, 
those also which have scales or spots on their surface ; and, 
whatever may be their apparent properties, all those which 
have arrived at their full development, or when they exhibit 
any signs of change, should be used with caution. When there 
is any doubt as to the qualities of the mushrooms, it is advisable 
to cut them into slices, and macerate them in vinegar and water 
for about an hour, then wash them in boiling water previous to 
their being cooked. It has been proved that some injurious 
Fungi lose their poisonous properties when thus treated. It is 
quite true that, by following strictly the above rules, edible 
species will not unfrequently be thrown away, but this is of little 
comparative importance, as by so doing all injurious ones will 
certainly be rejected. Probably the best tests given above are, 
to avoid those which are milky, or which have a biting or acrid 
taste, or those which have a powerful or disagreeable odour. 
Colour will frequently fail us, for while some snowy-white Fungi 
are poisonous, others, which are highly coloured, as, for instance, 
Agaricus cxsareus, are, according to Berkeley, at once the most 
splendid and the best of the esculent Fungi. 
Professor Schiff, of Florence, states that the poisonous 
mushrooms have a common poison which he has termed muws- 
carine, and that its effects are counteracted either by atropine or 
daturine ; and it is said that Italian apothecaries now keep these 
alkaloids in the rural districts where the consumption of 
poisonous Fungi is probable. But no confirmation of these 
results has as yet been arrived at by other experimenters so far 
as to prove that muscarine is thus widely distributed, but its 
presence has been ascertained in Amanita muscaria, and it is 
stated to be antagonistic to atropine. (See Amanita.) 
The species or varieties of Fungi most commonly consumed 
in this country are: the Common Mushroom (Agaricus (Psalliota) 
campestris) and its varieties—those which are cultivated should 
be preferred; Agaricus (Psalliota) arvensis, Agaricus (Marasmius) 
oreades, the Champignon, Morchella esculenta, the Morel, Tuber 
cibariwm, the Truftie, and several species of Boletus. Of all these 
the best known in this country is the common Mushroom, 
whether in its uncultivated or cultivated state; and as other 
Fungi are frequently mistaken for this, by which many deaths 
have occurred, we may give one or two hints in reference to it 
besides those given previously. Thus its spores are purple ; 
