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likewise occurs abundantly in this vicinity until very late in the 
season, but is confined to the stumps and roots of deciduous 
trees, appearing in conspicuous reddish clusters of considerable 
size. Its flavor is not particularly good, but it is useful because 
of its very late appearance, and it improves puffballs and other 
species with little flavor when mixed with them. 
Puffballs are the safest of all mushrooms for the beginner, none 
of them being eee Oh they are at the same time very 
excellent and very easy to 
The field puffball (PI. ns js 1) is found on the lawns and in 
fields where the common mushroom grows. Very few persons 
seem to know its excellence. It is often picked when young 
because of a faint resemblance to the common mushroom in 
color, and at once thrown away. The accompanying illustration 
was made from a specimen collected in the fruticetum of the 
Garden, measuring six inches in diameter, but it is often not 
larger than a good-sized pear, which it somewhat resembles in 
shape. The surface is gray and nearly smooth, and the inside 
milk-white, becoming purple when old and dry. The name puff- 
ball is assigned because of the cloud of dust which arises from one 
of these old dried specimens when stepped upon 
A much smaller kind, about the size of a large marble, is 
abundant in the same localities where the field puffball occurs 
(Pl. 55, fig. 7). It is pure white and so abundantly adorned wit 
spines that it appears shaggy. When older, these spines peel 
away and show the thin, brown inner coat, thus suggesting the 
name “ separating’”’ puffba 
The studded puffball (Pl. 55, fig. 3), found on the ground in 
woods, is smaller than the field puffball, but is abundant and has 
a longer season. It is pure white, pear-shaped, and ornamented 
with spines having bases resembling cut gems. Another kind, 
slightly darker and smaller but of similar shape, called the pear- 
shaped puffball, occurs in dense clusters on rotten logs and stumps 
in woods. I have found this abundant here late in November. 
The giant puffball, which is rarely smaller than a man’s head 
and sometimes attains the huge size of ten feet in circumference, 
also occurs in woods, usually near old stumps or in rich leaf- 
