THE MYCOLOGICAL SITUATION IN AMERICA. 



I have to write so many letters to my correspondents in reply to in- 

 quiries as to what literature to buy in order to study mycology that I feel 

 it will save time to issue a printed letter on the subject. 



Unfortunately there is no one book of much service. I always advise 

 my correspondents to first buy Atkinson's "Mushrooms, Edible, Poisonous, 

 etc." It is the best book we have. It is only a primer and does not consider 

 one out of twenty of the agarics you will meet every season, but you can 

 derive from it a general idea of classification. It is a difficult matter to 

 get a "start" in American mycology, and I have reason to know that Atkin- 

 son had a hard enough time to learn what he knew at the time he wrote 

 the book. So I believe he should have all praise for what he has done, not 

 hiding the fact that there is a great deal of room to do much better as he 

 learns more of the subject. 



The next book of service is Miss Marshall's "Mushroom Book," chiefly 

 on account of the pictures which are much better than the text. Like the 

 preceding it is purely elementary and considers only a few common species. 



Dr. Herbst's "Fungal Flora of the Lehigh Valley," Pennsylvania, is a 

 very useful book because it considers many common plants that every one 

 will meet. Unfortunately the illustrations are very poor. 



When you have begun to get an insight into the genera, buy Steven- 

 son's "British Fungi." It is chiefly a translation of Fries, but it is all the 

 more valuable on that account. Fries was the great master of agarics in 

 Europe, and universally held to be the best authority, but his writings are 

 in Latin, and while they are the court of final resort, you will not need 

 them until you reach the "new species" stage. 



Massee's "British Fungus Flora," four volumes, is the latest English 

 work and is largely used in England. The arrangement of the genera de- 

 parts from all other works and it is so difficult to find anything in it that 

 I rarely use it. It always reminds me of a house I saw on the Midway 

 where everything was upside down. 



The fungi of Europe and America are for the most part the same 

 species, and thus any European work will be of service in America. It is 

 my firm belief that the greater part of the plants in America that have 

 been described as new species, are European plants not recognized. Fail- 

 ure to identify the American plants from the conflicting accounts and illus- 

 trations that have been given of them in Europe is to no man's discredit. 

 To reach conclusions when working with agarics in Europe is a task diffi- 

 cult enough: in America it is impossible. If American mycologists had 

 any practical way of learning the American names for the agarics they 

 meet it would be a great help. There is but one man, in my opinion, to-day, 

 who has a practical field knowledge of most American agarics and who 

 could write a manual that would be of real benefit. That man is Professor 

 Charles Peck, of New York. Most of his past time has been spent in issuing 

 isolated descriptions. They are of very little service, and it is my experience 



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