NOTES ON ALKALOIDS AND OTHER SUBSTANCES. 
49 
lieat both muscarine and amanitine yield triinethylamine. The 
passage from muscarine and amanitine to betaine has not yet been 
effected. The price of muscarine, either natural or artificial, is Is. 
per grain. 1 have not seen amanitine mentioned in a price list, 
except as choline orneurine. 
The singular occurrences of amanitine (neurine or choline) are 
another link between fungi and the animal kingdom. The pro- 
duction of these bodies artificially is of great interest, as very few 
natural alkaloids have yet been artificially made ; and these suc- 
cesses lead us to hope that we may some day produce such 
medicinal alkaloids as quinine and morphia by chemical means at a 
cheaper rate. 
Ido not know of any other alkaloids from fungi. I remember a 
paper by Phipson in the “ Chem. News ” about “ Agaricus 
violaceus” (Cortinarius ?), which professed to describe two new 
coloring matters and an alkaloid, but the information was very 
scanty. The processes are so tedious and costly. I myself tried 
to obtain an alkaloid from Boletus luridus, but failed. It requires 
about 1 cwt. of raw product to have any chance of success. 
Sehni asserts that mildew and the larger fungi give off hydrogen 
and carbonic acid gas. 
Taci (Comptes Kendus, Ixxvi, 505) gives the following analysis 
of Agaricus (Russula ?) foetens in percentages : — Water, 67 ; 
mannite, 0*6 ; fibrin (albuminoid matter), 4’ 6 ; gum, 1*5 ; fungin 
or cellulose, 20; fat, 0'68 ; ash, 5T3 ; with acids, coloring and 
odorous matters undetermined. 
THE GENUS ANTHOSTOMA. 
By M. C. Cooke. 
The genus Anthostoma, as adopted by Saccardo in his “ Sylloge,” 
cannot be considered by any means satisfactory, from his own point 
of view. Judgingfrom the heterogeneous mass of species collected 
in it, one is led to fancy it a sort of “ refuge for the destitute,” 
into which all the phaeosporous species, not according with the 
other genera, might find a temporary home. Simple and composite 
forms almost jostle each other, and such strange companions as 
the jSphceria gastrina of Fries, the Haloiiia cubicularis of Fries, 
and some species of Nummularia consort together in the same 
domicile. 
If the principle acceded to in other parts of the work, that com- 
posite should be kept apart from simple forms, then the second 
section of the genus must be taken by itself, with a few stragglers 
from the first section, with the generic name proposed by Nitschke 
of Fuckelia retained. Even with such a modification, there will 
be less symmetry in the genus than in the analogous one of Hy~ 
g)oxylon, for after all the ‘‘ idea ” of the genus appears to be, that it 
