MUSHROOMS AND OTHER FUNGI 
look for these. Of recent years also our foreign 
immigrants may sometimes be seen searching for and 
gathering fungi which were familiar to them in their 
native land. 
Of course, the chief cause of this general neglect 
of fungi as articles of food is the still pretty general 
notion that all toadstools are poisonous. Recent 
research has shown that mushrooms of all kinds have 
nutritive qualities much inferior to what was at one 
time supposed to be the case; but in this respect 
they probably stand as high, while they have at least 
as conspicuous gastronomic attractions, as the uni- 
versal turnip. There seems to be no good reason 
why the general advance in nature study should not 
bring us to a sufficient knowledge of the fungi to 
enable us to use the good and to know and eschew the 
few poisonous or deleterious ones which grow amongst 
the good. 
Porsonovs SPEciEs. 
Some really poisonous species, of course, there 
are, and, until the recognition of them forms part 
of ordinary rural lore, any general use of wild-grow- 
ing fungi as articles of food need not be hoped for. 
Almost every year, about the month of September, 
the newspapers report a case or two of fatal mush- 
room poisoning. It would seem that Amanita phal- 
loides is, in all cases, the culprit. In the district 
with which we are at present concerned, lying within 
a radius of fifty miles from Toronto, there would 
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