M U S H R O O M. 
280 
hours grows to a form and bulk that cannot fail to ex¬ 
cite aftoniihment. 
We mult of courfe eftablifii as a principle, that this 
fungiferous dull is at times more or let's conliderable in 
quantity, more or lets difpofed to produftion, and that 
all grounds, all forts of ibil, are not fuitable to it. Mil¬ 
lions of elementary parts of this dull: fail inceflantly ; 
but none with efficacy, except 'when alighting upon the 
deftined fpot; that is, upon the place which poffeffes the 
qualities requilite for the welfare of the ftranger j and yet 
it is furpriling that we never find the young fungus clofely 
attached, by any fort of roots, to the ground. A flight 
refiftance indeed, an apparent reluctance from leaving the 
turf upon which it grows, is offered generally by the fun¬ 
gus, when the hand carefully drives to wreft it, unbroken, 
from its native focket in the foil. Not that it holds to the 
mother-earth by any vilible roots, prongs, or claws; no 
chain fixes the plant to the ground; the ties are of mere 
alfedtion ; and the reliltance is limply occafioned by a fort 
of circular protuberance or knob at the lower end of the 
Item. It is around that knob, which mult have been the 
firft embryo of the mulhroom, that are placed the curious 
apparatus for nutrition ; the felf-moving and double en¬ 
gines, thatafpire and force up the neceffary juices for the 
development of the internal mould, for the fwelling of 
the capillary fyltem, and filling up the prepared and inva¬ 
riable llamina of the infant vegetable. Admirable me- 
chanifm ! as much above the more delicate and ingenious 
works of man, as man is below the fupreme and all-pow¬ 
erful Intelligence to whom he owes his life. And thefe 
innumerous fuckers, thefe imperceptible mouths, thele 
antliie ac vitales aditus, through which the inceflant ftreani 
of a nutritious fluid ruflies into organized life, are fo cu- 
rioufly adapted to their afligned places in Nature ; they fit 
them fo well, and yet fo exciufively ; that, once wrenched 
from the alimenting foil,no fubftitutecan be found; though 
placed in water as a plucked flower, or tranfplanted as any 
lprout, the fuvgulus, far from thriving and expanding it- 
felf, lulkily droops, withers, and dies ; as if indignant at 
having been difturbed from the ftate of filent, fecret, and 
peaceful, obfeurity, in which it had pleaded the wifdom 
of Providence to place it; and as if confcious, that an 
humble and unknown fituation is much lefs expofed to 
dangers from ambition and envy, than an exalted one. 
As it is generally in the filence and obfeurity of night 
that the mulhroom makes its appearance, the folemnity 
and awffulnefs of the time appointed for its birth has been 
taken hold of by the bufy mind of luperftition ; and thou- 
fands of tales have been invented, repeated, and confe- 
quently believed, in all ages, and in all countries, rela¬ 
tive to the origin and habits of this myflerious child of 
moifture and darknefs. Thefe two qualities leem really 
requilite for the produftion of the fungus. The damp 
fteps of a cellar, left unpeopled in the evening by the valet 
or houfemaid, when they return from drawing the lupper 
allowance of ale or wine, will, fometimes the next morn¬ 
ing, be found covered with hordes of mulhrooms, as if 
flung into fubitaneous exiftenceby fome mifehievous imps, 
or playful fairies in their frolics; and fuch was the vulgar 
belief in Shakelpeare’s time, for this great poet makes 
Profpero fay in his addrel's to the Elves : 
And you, whofe paftime 
Is to make midnight mulhrooms. Tempe.fi, a6l v. 
This appearance is fo very fudden, that the growth of 
the plant mull be uncommonly rapid; fo much fo, that 
it might nearly be perceptible to the eye. A mulhroom 
two inches in height and an inch in breadth on the dilk 
or cap, may, I am bold to fay, be produced in lefs than 
three hours. The progrefs of the alcent mull be there¬ 
fore in the fame proportion as the hour-hand of a clock, 
or at the rate of about fix feet in the fpace of four-and- 
twenty hours. Hence, the birth of the, fungus was looked 
upon not only as myflerious, but as miraculous, or fuper- 
natural. Other confederations have alfo contributed to 
that belief. 
We leldom find mulhrooms in their nonage; they ap¬ 
pear, for the moll part, adult all at once ; and, like Adam, 
leem created at the age of maturity. However, the near 
obferver of Nature will perceive that, in feveral fpecimens 
which are taken for two fpecies, there is adlually but one 
individual. Can any plant differ more from another than 
this infant fungus does from the mature one, and this 
from the decrepid individual, all reprefented on the an¬ 
nexed Plate, at fig. i. a, b, c? or at fig. 2. and 3 ? where 
the different ages afl’ume forms fo dilcrepant from each 
other ? And in this we mull admire the inexhaultible 
character of pieafing variety that Nature has ftamped upon 
her works, without, however, deviating from that won¬ 
derful fimplicity of agency which pervades the whole 
creation. For, although the vegetable, which is the fub- 
je£l of this eflay, may be let alide as a clafs, order, and 
genus, by it felt, with, in its humble retirement, all the 
majefty of linglenefs, like the Thibetian Lama, to whom 
it bears no flight analogy in its peculiarities ; yet it fhows, 
in its development and progrefs, the lame invariable con¬ 
formity to the laws of Nature as obferva'oie in other plants. 
May we not, however, fubmit here a lingular diftindtion, 
purporting that the fungus is born a fruit, not a flower; 
and that, androgynally conflituted, in a more powerful 
and Ampler manner than the other plants, it does not un¬ 
dergo the long procefs of erfiorefcence and fructification 
as the univerlal tribes of vegetables are doomed to do ? 
Its prompt acceflion to adultnefs confirms our furmife; 
and the fimilarity of tafte in the young ones, among thole 
that are eatable, with the more mature individuals, feems 
to prove irreiiftibly the truth of the hypothefis. No fruit, 
proceeding from a flower, is ripe till it arrives to a certain 
point; but the mulhroom is mature at its birth, or, at any 
rate, as foon as it burfts from the native bed. An ulterior 
development of the parts feems, confequently, deflined 
lefs to the greater perfedlion of the feed, than to the dif- 
perfion of it. The mufcular parts are perfedl, but not 
developed. 
Of the exiftence of this feed, although it is impercepti¬ 
ble, we can have no doubt. There is no effedl without a 
caufe; and the fyftem which Nature has adopted in the 
reproduftion of individuals, is fo conftantly and invaria¬ 
bly the fame, from man to the fmalleft animal, from the 
cedar of Lebanon to the humble hyfl'op, that we are led to 
fuppofe the fame procefs of generation in mulhrooms as 
in any other living creature. The difperfion of the pollen, 
or dull, is proved in the daily cuftom of rearing them, on 
prepared beds, merely by fprinkling the water in which 
the ripe ones have been walhed. But the auellion Hill re¬ 
mains to know whether this impalpable dull is a fort of 
pollen, or the real feed. If merely a prolific dull, the 
ovarium mull be fomewdiere; if a fecundated leed, we alk 
where and how the impregnation took place ? There is 
here an inextricable knot. That the pollen, diffuled in 
the air, might meet the prepared ovarium and give it life, 
is according to the procefs remarked in fiihes and fome 
amphibious animals, who do not fecundate the eggs till 
after they are dropped by the female; and then, we mull 
allow that this ovarium, or duller of expeftant feeds, has 
already been exhaled from the plant. Among all thefe 
hypotliefes, the limpleft fyftem is always the bell, in elu¬ 
cidating the mylleries of Nature; and confequently, 
many botanills leem inclined to think, that the connubial 
rites are performed with the utmoft fecrecy, within the 
laciniate, multi-coloured, and fringed, curtains, and un¬ 
der the llately and golden canopy of the fungus; whilft, 
thumping their hazel-nut'tambourines, the elves and fai¬ 
ries ling the Epitha/amiiim, and dance their fantaftic reels 
around the magic ring, in the dark and midnight foli- 
tudes of lequellered valleys, or in any other nook where 
dampnefs, lonelinefs, and oblcurity, contribute to fecure 
the efteds of their performances. No wonder, indeed, if 
the 
