Q^ntxodactioD 



I PROMINENT botanical authority con- 

 nected with one of our universities, 

 upon learning of my intention of per- 

 petrating a popular work on our ed- 

 ible mushrooms and toadstools, was inclined 

 to take issue with me on the wisdom of such 

 publication, giving as his reasons that, owing 

 to the extreme difficulty of imparting exact 

 scientific knowledge to the " general reader," such a 

 work, in its presumably imperfect interpretation by 

 the very individuals it is intended to benefit, would 

 only result, in many instances, in supplanting the 

 popular wholesome distrust of all mushrooms with 

 a rash over-confidence which would tend to increase 

 the labors of the family physician and the coroner. 

 And, to a certain extent, in its appreciation of the 

 difficulty of imparting exact science to the lay mind, 

 his criticism was entirely reasonable, and would cer- 

 tainly apply to any treatise on edible mushrooms for 

 popular circulation which contemplated a too exten- 

 sive field, involving subtle botanical analysis and nice 

 differentiation between species. 



