10 MUSHROOMS. 



-hat dwell neer the sea, and have fish at will, are vei7 

 desirous, for change of diet, to feede upon the birds of the 

 mouiitaines; and such as dwell vpon the hills and champion 

 grounds doe long after sea-fish; many that haue plenty of 

 both doe hunger after the earthie exoresenoe^, called mush- 

 rooms : fewe of them are good to be eaten, and most of them 

 doe suffocate and strangle the eater. Therefore I glue my 

 simple auduice vnto those that loue such strange and newe 

 fangled meates, to beware of licking honie among thornes, 

 least the sweetness of the one do not counteruaile the sharp- 

 ness and pricking- of the other." Lord Bacon is equally 

 quaint in his reference to the Mushroom. He says : " Mush- 

 rooms have two strange properties : the one that they yield 

 so delicious a meate; the other, that they come up so hastily, 

 as in a night, and yet are unsown ; and therefore, such as 

 are upstarts in state are called in reproach mushrooms. We 

 find that mushrooms cause the accident we call Incubus, or 

 the mare in the stomach ; and therefore the surfeit of them 

 may sufl'ocate and empoyson, and this showeth that they 

 are windy, and that their windiness is gross and swelling, 

 not sharp and griping." These opinions clearly indicate 

 that mushrooms were not appreciated a few centuries ago. 



Stephen )Switzer, a skilled gardener in the time of Queen 

 Anne, seems to have been the first English author to deal 

 with the culture of the Mushroom. The first book published 

 solely devoted to the subject appeared in 1779 from the pen 

 of John Aberorombie. It was entitled " The Garden Mush- 

 room : Its Nature and Cultivation, exhibiting full and plain 

 Directions for Producing this Desirable Plant in Perfection 

 and Plenty." From this fact we may reasonably assume 

 that a good deal of attention was being paid at that time 

 to the Mushroom. 



In the last century great strides were made in the culti- 

 vation of mushrooms. In all the larger type of gardens 

 special structures were built expressly for growing them, 

 and a more or less continuous supply was maintained by 

 the skill of the gardener. The idea of growing mushrooms 

 thus is recorded to be due to Oldacre, gardener to Sir Joseph 



