INTRODUCTION 29 



The salt test (21), with that of the silver charm, is 

 also a relic of the dim past, but is absolutely useless 

 as a touchstone. Many poisonous spe- 

 Worthless cies, notably the Amanita, fail to answer 

 popular tests to it. All authorities agree, however, 

 that the addition of salt in cooking, or 

 the preparatory soaking of specimens in brine, has a 

 tendency to render poisonous species, innocuous. In- 

 deed, it is claimed that in Russia and elsewhere on 

 the Continent many admittedly poisonous species, 

 even the deadly Fly Amanita, is habitually eaten sub- 

 sequent to this semi-corning process, by which the 

 poisonous chemical principle is neutralized. 



Among this long list, and many other equally 



arbitrary and ignorant prejudicial traditions, many 



of which date back to the earliest 



Omission times, it is indeed astonishing to note 

 of the only ' . ° 



true test the conspicuous absence or the one and 



only valuable sign by which the fatal 

 species could be unmistakably determined — a symbol 

 which was reserved for botanical science to discover: 

 the presence of the " cup " in the Amanita, which is 

 pointedly emphasized in my Frontispiece, and the im- 

 portance of which as a botanical and cautionary dis- 

 tinction is considered at more length in the following 

 chapter. 



It is well to consider for a moment what is im- 

 plied in 



"A POISONOUS MUSHROOM" 



A fungus may be poisonous in various ways : 

 I. A distinct and certain deadly poison. 



