If the notes that make up these bulletins of the Club seem to any to 
deal with simple and elementary matters, it must be remembered that 
many of those who are joining us are without knowledge of fungi and 
perhaps ignorant of botany,and that the prime object of the Club is educa¬ 
tional. So far as possible the bulletins will try to meet some of the 
needs of all, and to be helpful to students as well as to would-be myco- 
phagists. Queries and suggestions will be gladly received. 
From those members who are not satisfied with knowing the half 
hundred common kinds that may be learned from the small popular 
books of Cooke, Gibson, Peck, or Michael come repeated inquiries for 
help in further study. They are continually finding species that they 
can not place, — that can not be found even in Stevenson, or Massee, 
or in Peck’s Reports.* 
To such inquiries the only answer must be a recommendation to patience 
— and perhaps to more careful study. Failure in identification may 
be due to difficulties in a subject not fully mastered — and hard to 
master; it may be due to incompleteness or other fault in the descrip¬ 
tions as printed, a supposition, unfortunately, only too well founded ; 
it may be that a description which was originally made from a European 
or a British plant does not exactly fit the American representative 
of that plant, in which case the judgment of an expert is necessary, 
and the inexperienced student must remain in perplexity; or it may 
very well be that the plant in hand is not described in any book available, 
and possibly not described at all. For in the matter of fungi the Ameri¬ 
can field is only partially explored, and we have as yet no Gray’s Manual, 
or Chapman’s Flora to guide us when Ave go abroad in it. What then is 
the poor impatient student to do ? For of course he wants the names. 
The easiest way, and the most natural, is to ask somebody who can tell 
him. But such a somebody is not always within reach, nor can he 
always answer point-blank. Hence the recommendation to patience. 
After all the name of a fungus or of any plant is not the vital thing. 
To be impatient for one, and to insist upon having it, if not from one 
source then from another, is to run the risk of going far astray. And in 
the pursuit of the name the plant itself is often neglected. When the 
label is neatly appended, there is often an end to curiosity and obser¬ 
vation. Now the essential thing for us is to know the plant; to observe 
it as it grows, and in its different stages; and to compare it with others, 
and hence learn its true relationship. Recognizing it when we see it, we 
can name it, to ourselves, the “ Red Lactarius from the Woodlot,” or the 
“ Sawmill Collybia,” and keep track of it with our note book. In time, 
no doubt, the botanical name will be forth coming, and meanwhile we 
are getting better acquainted with our mushroom. 
As to nomenclature it may be said that in the binomial system, in 
general use since the time of Linnaeus, the first of the names is that of 
the genus or group of closely related species to which a given plant 
belongs. The second name, in the form of an adjective, designates the 
species. In most cases generic and specific names are descriptive of some 
peculiarity of color or structure ; sometimes also they indicate habitat, 
locality, or country, or are given in honor of some botanist The abbre¬ 
viation following is that of the name of the botanist who originally 
published the description of the species and gave the name. Thus 
Cortinarius cinnamomeus Fr. is the “ Cinnamon-colored Web-veiled Mush¬ 
room , so named by Fries, the Swedish botanist, who first systematized 
the classification of fungi. 
* 1 he new edition of Peck’s 48th Report, with plates, for which a hundred 
or more members are waiting, is expected in October. For these and other 
works of reference see Bulletin No. 2, or the list on the cover of Peck’s 
“ Mushrooms and 1 heir Use,’’ published by the Cambridge Botanical Supply 
Company. 
