24 A PLAIN AND EASY ACCOUNT 



TRUE AGARICS. 



THE genus Agaricus bears a name, the origin of 

 which is involved in a little obscurity, from whence the 

 Rev. M. J. Berkeley, the prince of British mycologists, 

 has thus endeavoured to rescue it : 



" In all books which profess to give the derivations 

 of botanical terms, it is said that Agaricus derives its 

 name from Agaria, a region in Sarmatia, or from 

 Agarus, a town and river in the same country. This 

 derivation, at first sight, seems equally absurd with the 

 parallel drawn by Fluellen between Macedon and Mon- 

 rnouth. What has Sarmatia to do with toadstools more 

 than any other country, as they are found everywhere ? 

 The fact, however, is, that the original name, Agaricum, 

 for so it stands in Pliny, had nothing whatever to do 

 with them, but was applied by Dioscorides to a peculiar 

 drug, supplied by the Potyporus of the larch, which 

 was obtained principally, if not solely, from Agaria, but 

 which, though formerly of considerable repute, appears 

 now to have gone almost entirely out of use in regular 

 practice. It is, however, still to be had of the herbalists, 

 who import it from Germany, a form on Larix siberica 

 being obtained occasionally from Archangel. As the 

 true species occurs only on the larch, and, indeed, upon 

 very old trees, it is confined almost entirely to places 

 where that genus of conifers is indigenous. 



" Other Polypori have often been substituted for 

 that of the larch, and, therefore, the name Agaricum, 



