260 FOOTNOTES FROM 



destroyed, the magistrates interposed and put an end to 

 the practice. A nearly allied species, called Helvella 

 crispa, is also highly esteemed in some quarters as an 

 agreeable esculent, though hardly known in this country. 

 It is a remarkable-looking fungus, occasionally occurring 

 in woods in autumn. The stem is from three to five 

 inches high, snowy-white, irregular, hollow, deeply fur- 

 rowed, often full of holes or sinuses like the fluted trunk 

 of the yarroura or paddle-wood of the Indians. The cap 

 is deflexed, and commonly divided into curled or folded 

 lobes which adhere to the stem, but it is extremely irre- 

 gular and variable, and has neither gills nor pores. Its 

 substance is wax-like and extremely friable, the surface 

 being soft like satin. 



The most valuable, however, of all the esculent fungi 

 is probably the truffle (Tuber cibarium, Fig. 34). This 



curious subterranean puff- 

 ball, for such it is, is so 

 local and scarce that it 

 I is very little known ex- 

 cept amongst wealthy and 

 titled families in this 

 country, seldom appear- 



FIG. 34. TDBEB CIBARIUM. ing at common tables ; 

 and probably the greater part of what is sold is im- 

 ported. It is very rare in Scotland, but exceedingly 

 abundant in some parts of England. It is usually found 

 in beech-woods, growing in clusters half a foot or a foot 

 beneath the soil. In appearance it is a rounded, rough, 

 irregular nodule like a potato ; at first white, afterwards 

 black, cracked like a pine-apple, or a pine cone, into 



