possible in the eating of a prosaic potato. You 

 are on the verge all the time of discovery of 

 quail on toast, oysters, beefsteak, macaroni, 

 caviar, or liver, according to your nationality, 

 native fancy, and mycological intensity. 

 The variety of meats, flavors, and wholesome 

 nutrients found in mushrooms by the average 

 mycologist beggars all the tales told by breakfast- 

 food manufacturers. After listening to a warm 

 mycologist one feels as Caleb felt at sight of the 

 grapes and pomegranates : the children of Anak 

 may be there, but this land of the mushroom is 

 the land /of milk and honey ; let us go up at 

 once and possess it. 



If eating mushrooms quickens the fancy, the 

 gathering of them sharpens the eye and trains 

 the mind to a scientific accuracy in detail that 

 quite balances any tendency toward a gustato- 

 poetic extravagance. When one's life, when so 

 slight a matter as one's dinner, depends upon the 

 nicest distinctions in stem, gills, color, and age, 

 even a Yankee will cease guessing and make a 

 desperate effort to know what he is about. 



Here is where brick-top commends itself over 

 many other species of mushroom that approach 

 [238] 



