THE DEADLY AMANITA 57 



often characterizes the volva as " incomplete " or " ob- 

 scure," and the stem as " rough and scaly." If the 

 portraits in these works are correct, the Amanita 

 qualities of the species are clearly displayed, but if 

 their accompanying descriptions are to be credited, 

 and such seem to be in perfect accord with the spec- 

 imens which I have always found, the A. muscarius 

 would seem in need of a more authentic historian. 



The example figured in the plate presents the 

 stem and volva as they have always appeared in 

 specimens obtained by the writer. In the young 

 individuals the stem is waxy-white, becoming later 

 a dull, pale ochre hue, the lower half being shaggy 

 and torn, and beset with loose projecting woolly 

 points which resolve themselves below into scales 

 with loose tips curved outward, and so distantly dis- 

 posed upon the bulbous base as to leave no marked 

 definition of the continuous rim or opening of a cup. 

 But the cup is there, and in a section of the bud state 

 of the mushroom could have been seen, even as in the 

 white warts upon the surface of the younger speci- 

 mens we note the evidences of the upper portion of 

 the same white volva. In many other 

 Volva scales species of Amanita, notably A. vernus, 

 permanent as already mentioned, these volva frag- 

 ments generally wither and are shed 

 from the cap. They are thus not to be counted on 

 as a permanent token. But in the fly -mushroom 

 they form a distinct character, as they adhere firmly 

 to the smooth skin of the pileus, and in drying, instead 

 of shrivelling and curling and falling off, simply 

 shrink, turn brownish, and in the maturely expanded 



