244 



Mycologia 



Sometimes it requires two minutes. If the color then persisted, 

 there would be no special need to watch the changes occur, but in 

 several cases a secondary change occurs which obscures the first 

 discoloration. Prof. H. C. Beardslee, of Asheville School, Ashe- 

 ville, N. C, seems to have been the first one to publish any record 

 of an intermedate change to red in Russulae outside of the group 

 to which Russula nigricans (Bull.) Fr. belongs. In Mycologia 

 6:91. 1914 he described R. rubescens, which differs from Rus- 

 sula obscura Rom. in that the wounds become red and then gray 

 or black. In the summer of 1916 I determined to look for inter- 

 mediate color changes in the flesh of all Russulae. I found that 

 specimens exactly like what I had formerly referred to R. obscura 

 Rom. showed within two minutes after the flesh had been broken 

 a change to peach-red, but that after about five minutes the 

 wounds had become gray. Prof. Beardslee says in regard to 

 specimens of these which I sent him : " They seem to be the same 

 as my R. rubescens" Miss Ann Hibbard, a member of the Bos- 

 ton Mycological Club who spent part of the summer collecting 

 with me, observed the same change to red and then to gray in the 

 broken flesh of a yellow Russula conforming in all other respects 

 to R. flava Lindbl. The question has naturally arisen, does the 

 flesh of R. flava become red, then gray, and I am awaiting an 

 answer to this question from Prof. Romell before pronouncing 

 this a new species. In October Miss Hibbard wrote me from 

 Boston : " There were two more R. rubescens at the club exhibi- 

 tion yesterday which were called R. obscura, but the stems turned 

 red when I scratched them." Since in other characteristics R. 

 rubescens often resembles R. obscura, it is mostly impossible to 

 tell whether herbarium material which has been identified as R, 

 obscura is this species or R. rubescens. Enough has been said to 

 show the importance of the most careful observations regarding 

 the change of color in the broken flesh. 



The color of the lamellae in both young and mature specimens 

 should be ascertained, as in some species the color of young 

 lamellae is yellow while in others it is white at first, becoming 

 yellow with maturity. The arrangement of the lamellae affords 

 a permanent characteristic which can be used in classification, 



