BKICK-TOP 



THAT man was not only an item in tlie reck- 

 oning when tlie world was made, but that 

 his attributes were anticipated too, is every- 

 where attested by the way nature makes use of 

 his wreckage. She provides bountifully for his 

 comfort, and, not content with this, she takes 

 his refuse, his waste, what he has bungled and 

 spoiled, and out of it fashions some of her rarest, 

 daintiest delicacies. She gathers up his chips 

 and cobs, his stubble and stumps,— the crumbs 

 which fall from his table,— and brings them back 

 to him as the perfection of her culinary art. 



So, at least, any one with an imagination and 

 a cultivated taste will say after he has eaten 

 that October titbit, the brick-top mushroom. 



The eating of mushrooms is a comparatively 



unappreciated privilege in our country. The 



taste is growing rapidly ; but we have such an 



abundance of more likely stuff to live upon that 



[235] 



