246 



NEW YORK STATE MU8EI M 



The three species here described may be tabulated as follows: 



Stem not bulbous : 1 



Stem with a bulbous base C. violaceus. 



1 Cap viscid or glutinous when moist C. collinitus. 



1 Cap not viscid, dry and fibrillose C. cinnamomeus. 



Cortinarius vioiaceus Fr. 



YluLET COKTINARICS. 

 Plate 12. 



Pileus convex, becoming nearly pi me, dry, adorned with 

 numerous persistent hairy tufts or scales, dark violet ; lamellae 

 rather thick, distant, rounded or deeply notched at the inner 

 extremity, colored like the pileus in the young plant, brownish- 

 cinnamon in the mature plant ; stem solid, fibrillose, bulbous, 

 colored like the pileus ; spores subelliptical, .0005 in. long. 



The Violet cortinarius is a very beautiful mushroom and one 

 easy of recognition. At first the whole p^ant is uniformly 

 colored, but with age the gills assume a dingy ochraceous or 

 brownish-cinnamon hue. The cap is generally well formed and 

 regular and is beautifully adorned with little hairy scales or tufts. 

 These are rarely shown in figures of the European plant, but they 

 are quite noticeable in the American plant and should not be 

 overlooked. The flesh is more or less tinged with violet. 



The gills when young are colored like the cap. They are 

 rather broad, notched at the inner extremity and narrowed 

 toward the margin of the cap. When mature they become 

 dusted with the spores whose color they take. 



The stem also is colored like the cap. It is swollen into a bulb 

 at the base and sometimes a faint rusty-ochraceous band may be 

 seen near the top. This is due to the falling spores which lodge 

 on the webby filaments of the veil remaining attached to the 

 stem. 



Cap two to four inches broad, stem three to five inches long, 

 about half an inch thick. 



The Violet cortinarius grows among fallen leaves in the woods 

 of our hilly and mountainous districts, in July and August. I 

 have never found it in the open country. It is solitary or scat- 

 tered in its growth and not very plentiful. ^Nevertheless it is a 

 very good species to eat, and when botanizing in the extensive 



