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NOTES AND QUERIES ON RUSSULJE. 



[By Dr. M. C. Cookk.] 



Apology of some kind seems necessary for the introduction of technical papers at 

 unseasonable times, but opportunity has for the past two years been exceptionally 

 rare for the consideration of technical subjects at the Woolhope Foray, and 

 although dinners and soirees may, in a sense, be degraded from their high office 

 by such an interpolation, it is a deed of necessity which excuses the demoralization. 

 Opportunities for the discussion, face to face, amongst mycologists of points 

 of difficulty are exceedingly rare, and indeed the present is almost the only chance 

 from year to year of "settling up ;" so that it is almost too great a sacrifice to 

 expect us to abandon it without a struggle. Into whatever branch of Natural 

 History a person plunges, it is inevitable that the deeper he goes the more subtle 

 will be the difficulties he encounters, and probably, at the same time, the keener 

 will be his sense of the reconciliations which may be effected. Experience is a 

 much more efficient guide than books, but this source of knowledge has no efficiency 

 except for the individual, if driven to isolation, or condemned to a persistent 

 monopoly of the results. It matters not that one has struggled with difficulties for 

 years, until perhaps he sees bright glimpses of light through the darkness, if he is 

 to die and make no sign. Labour will have been useless, save to him, if he fails 

 to communicate to others his hopes and fears, his interpretations of dimly 

 discerned facts, or his suspicions of accepted tradition. This may be received as 

 the best apology which can be offered for an unwelcome intrusion, and, with such 

 a prospect before us for the succeeding ten minutes, we can only advise the 

 uninterested to close their eyes for that brief period, and sink into the oblivion of 

 profound repose. It will be admitted, without proof, that the study of the genus 

 of Russula amongst Fungi of the Mushroom type is one which has been regarded 

 as about the most difficult. Of course there are difficulties everywhere, especially 

 when no effort is made to surmount them, but the difficulties in the way of the 

 determination of species, with any degree of personal satisfaction, in this peculiar 

 genus must be tried to be appreciated. Cortinarius has its difficulties, for 

 example, but they appear to dwindle in the face of those which beset Russula. 

 This genus, nearly all the species of which were in the remote past lumped 

 together under the one name of Agaricus integer, is remarkable in many par- 

 ticulars, but in none more than in the general sameness of habit, home, and 

 structure, and the great variety of their coloration. None of the Agaricini 

 present more brilliant colours, or in greater variety, and none perhaps less 

 diversity in form. This seems to be an initial difficulty, for if form varies so 

 little, and colour is not to be relied upon, how is determination to be accom- 

 plished ? It may be affirmed that, at the outset, there is less difficulty in fixing 

 the genus than in almost any other, for the merest tyro is soon able to declare this 

 or that to be a Russula, when he would be puzzled over a Marasmius or a 

 Cortinarius. With a Russula, then, pure and simple, there is no difficulty. No one 



