234 ECONOMIC MYCOLOGY. 



In the autumn of 1868 the first Fungus Foray was made to Holme 

 Lacey, under the superintendence of our staunch friends, Messrs. Lees 

 and Worthiugtou Smith. These forays have gradually grown in interest, 

 increasing numbers join them, and an abundant supply of papers 

 notifying new facts and discoveries is annually read. 



Many of the most distinguished mycologists have done us the honour 

 of attending them. The Club will be proud to mention the names of 

 Berkeley, Broome, Cooke, Currey, Plowright, Philhps, Renny, Vize, 

 Houghton, Percival, Cornu, De-Seynes, and several others who have 

 again and again been present at our forays. 



The active interest of our members in the study of funguses was 

 at once excited by calling attention to the edible kinds. It was shown 

 that a large amount of vegetable matter containing nitrogen, hitherto 

 allowed to waste year after year, might be utilised as food. Experience 

 has shown, however, that an idea so philanthropic is not in England 

 practically feasible. Few species of Agaric are edible, more are tasteless 

 or disagreeable, and some that are poisonous are unfortunately too 

 common. 



The compai'ative scarcity of uncultivated land in this country, and the 

 uncertain and, as it were, capricious growth of Agarics, put quite out of 

 the question any reliance on them as a source of food for the people, the 

 more especially as other food is happily so abundant. It still remains, 

 however, for the scientific epicure to distingiiish and profit by them, as 

 he assturedly may do, and gather from them a varied and delicious 

 relish. 



The study of Mycology deserves all the ardour with which it has 

 been recently followed ; to it we owe the knowledge of those de?tructiTe 

 agents, the various kinds of moulds, smuts, rusts, &c., that are called 

 blight. The term blight is too indefinite. It is indiscriminately apphed 

 to funguses, to insects, and to diseases caused in the young and tender 

 parts of plants by sudden alterations in the temperature or the amount 

 of moisture in the atmosphere. Most living plants and animals are at 

 times more or less infested with funguses, which are nourished at their 

 expense, very often to the eventual destruction of both. Some of those 

 parasites attaclk man himself, as shown by the production of various 

 kinds of ringworm and thrush. The belief is growing that diphtheria, 

 cholera, low fevers, and other such complaints, may be caused by 

 microscopic funguses. It is an unhappy fact that these parasitical pests 

 take up a residence on those vegetables that are the most useful to man, 

 viz., those which produce starch. Of these the cereals are the most 

 important. Eust and mildew attack the leaves, stem, and bracts, while 

 ergot, smut, and bunt attack the organs of fi-uctification of barley, wheat, 

 rye, oats, maize, rice, and other cereals. 



The com rust and mildew are the same species of Pnccinia in 

 different stages of gi-owth. It may be found on almost every grass in 

 every part of the world ; but it seems to have a preference for wheat- 

 Conoral attention appears to have been directed to it for the first time in 

 1804, when Bauer made di-awings for George III. The wheat of that 



