86 MUSHROOM CULTURE. 



piece, thirty inches wide and nearly a foot deep, the 

 subsoil was broken up with strong steel forks, and upon 

 that the dung covering the next strip was placed, ai d 

 covered with the surface soil of the next trench ; and 

 so the work proceeded until the manure was put out 

 of sight. I may remark that the dung, especially that 

 around the walls, contained evidence of being strongly 

 impregnated with mushroom spawn, though this was not 

 regarded as being likely to produce a crop of the escu- 

 lent. A soaking rain falling, the ground was immediately 

 planted with brassicas, which grew as if they could not 

 help growing and in fact they could not. 



" We had not planted for mushrooms, nor were mush- 

 rooms expected ; but, walking round one morning early 

 in September, a bunch of splendid fellows presented 

 themselves, so large and thick and solid, that when I 

 took them in for breakfast my chef de cuisine and ' better 

 half had grave doubts as to whether they were ' the 

 real thing/ However, they were eaten, and the present 

 writing is a proof that they did not poison me. Return- 

 ing to the plot, I found the bunch gathered was not a 

 solitary one on the contrary, the ground was literally 

 paved with mushrooms, many of them so large that bushels 

 were gathered for ketchup within a few hours ; while the 

 retainers of a large establishment, down to the lowest 

 labourer, were in a fortnight positively sick of them, and 

 cartloads rotted upon the ground. 



