No.4o09..] REVIEWS OF RECENT LITERATURE. 67 
illustrations Mr. Gibson made possible the recognition of a few — 
but sufficient — common edible species, while the fact that nearly all 
of the fatal cases of toadstool poisoning are caused by Amanita mus- 
caria, and A. phalloides and its closest relatives, led him to brand the 
genus Amanita so forcibly that few of us now care to eat any volva- 
bearing agaric, however wholesome and delicious experience may 
have shown it to be. The only really weak point in his Our Edible 
Toadstools and Mushrooms lies in the very emphasis of this most 
wholesome warning against all amanitas, which causes the minor 
caution against lurid Boletuses, the emetic Russulas, and other 
* suspected " species to be overlooked, — a caution reiterated emphat- 
ically in Professor Farlow's review of the book in the columns of 
Garden and Forest. 
Mycological clubs and amateur mycophagists have wonderfully 
multiplied and thriven under the stimulus of this book, which, with 
its selection of a few unmistakable edible agarics and its branding 
as deadly of the Amanitas, provides a sufficiency of fungus food for 
ordinary culinary purposes, with a good mapping out of the safest 
lines of exploration for the venturesome who must go farther. So 
far as I know, no fatal or extremely serious cases of toadstool poison- 
ing traced to species not of Amanita have occurred in this country 
in the last few years, except that a well-known phycologist, turned 
mycophagist, slipped in his determination of a Boletus which he 
thought he recognized from one of Mr. Palmer's plates, and, with 
his family, paid a severe, if not the extreme penalty for the error ; 
and that one fatal mistake and several less serious ones have been 
made in considering Agaricus (Lepiota) morgani, an agaric rather 
common especiall in the West, as fit for food, as its congeners 
appear to be. : 
The latest important contributions to mushroom literature are by 
Professor Atkinson ! of Cornell University, a teacher of cryptogamic 
botany, and Captain Mcllvaine,? who for the past twenty years has 
been well to the front among the fungus-eaters in this country. 
Both of these writers are evidently aiming at the same purpose, 
! Atkinson, G. F. Studies of American Fungi. Mushrooms, Edible, Poison- 
ous, etc. Ithaca, N. Y., Andrus & Church, r9oo. vi + 275 pp. with 200 photo- 
graphs by the author and colored plates by F. R. Rathbun. ; 
? McIlvaine, C., and Macadam, R. K. Zvadsteols, Mushrooms, Fungi, Edible 
and Poisonous. One Thousand American Fungi: How to Select an Cook the 
_ Edible; How to Distinguish and Avoid the Poisonous. Indianapolis, The Bow 
dn Company, 1900. xxxvii + 704 pp. Pl. LXVII, and many illustrations in 
ext. 
