118 BEAUTIES OF THE FUNGI KACE. 



tuted for the production of the whole of this family 

 than England is, particularly that portion of them 

 denominated agarics. The various natures of our 

 soil and pastures, the profusion of our woods and 

 copses, the humidity of our climate, united with 

 the general warmth of our autumn, accelerating 

 rapid decay, and putrescence of vegetable matter, 

 all combine to give existence to this race. No 

 county is, I believe, more favoured for the pro- 

 duction of most of the kinds than Monmouth, with 

 its deep dark woods, and alpine downs. A resi- 

 dence in that portion of the kingdom for some 

 years introduced to my notice a larger portion of 

 this singular race than every botanist is acquainted 

 with. A sportsman then, but I fear I shall be 

 called a recreant brother of the craft, when I own 

 having more than once let my woodcock escape, 

 to secure and bear away some of these fair but 

 perishable children of the groves. Travellers tell 

 us of the splendour of this race in the jungles of 

 Madagascar, but nothing surely can exceed the 

 beauty of some old copse in Monmouthshire, deep 

 in the valley, calm, serene, shaded by the pensile, 

 elegant, autumnal-tinted sprays of the birch, the 

 ground enamelled with every coloured agaric, from 

 the deep scarlet to pallid white, the gentle gray, 

 and sober brown, and all their intermediate shad- 

 ings. Fungi must be considered as an appendage 

 and ornament of autumn ; they are not generally 



