254 FUNGI. 



palates, and its cultivation might be attempted. Burying a ripe 

 specimen in similar soil, and watering ground with the spores, 

 has been tried without success. * 



As to the methods adopted for cultivation of the common mush- 

 room, it is unnecessary to detail them here, as there are several 

 special treatises devoted to the subject, in which the particulars 

 are more fully given than the limits of this chapter will permit. f 

 Recently, M. Chevreul exhibited at the French Academy some 

 splendid mushrooms, said to have been produced by the following 

 method : he first develops the mushrooms by sowing spores on 

 a pane of glass, covered with wet sand ; then he selects the most 

 vigorous individuals from among them, and sows, or plants their 

 mycelium in a cellar in a damp soil, consisting of gardener's 

 mould, covered with a layer of sand and gravel two inches thick, 

 and another layer of rubbish from demolitions, about an inch deep. 

 The bed is watered with a diluted solution of nitrate of potash, 

 and in about six days the mushrooms grow to an enormous 

 size.J The cultivation of mushrooms for the market, even in 

 this country, is so profitable, that curious revelations sometimes 

 crop up, as at a recent trial at the Sheriffs' Court for compensa- 



* Experiments were made at Belvoir, by Mr. Ingram, in the cultivation of 

 several species of Ayaricini, but without success, and a similar fate attended 

 some spawn of a very superior kind from the Swan River, which was submitted 

 to the late Mr. J. Henderson. No result was obtained at Chiswick, either from 

 the cultivation of truffles or from the inoculation of grass-plots with excellent 

 spawn. Mr. Disney's experiments at the Hyde, near Ingatestone, were made with 

 dried truffles, and were not likely to succeed. The Yiscomte Noe succeeded in 

 obtaining abundant truffles, in an enclosed portion of a wood fenced from wild 

 boars, by watering the ground with an infusion of fresh specimens ; but it is 

 possible that as this took place in a truffle country , there might have been a crop 

 without any manipulation. Similar trials, and it is said successfully, have been 

 made with .Boletus edulis. Specimens of prepared truffle-spawn were sent many 

 years since to the "Gardener's Chronicle," but they proved useless, if indeed 

 they really contained any reliable spawn. 



f Robinson, "On Mushroom Culture," London, 1870. Cuthill, "On the 

 Cultivation of the Mushroom," 1861. Abercrombie, "The Garden Mushroom ; 

 its Culture, &c." 1802. 



t This has, however, not been confirmed, and is considered (how justly we 

 cannot say) a " canard." 



