CHAPTER XXL 
MUSHROOM GROWING IN THE PARIS CAVES. 
In caves and subterranean passages underneath the 
city of Paris and its environs, thousands of tons of mush¬ 
rooms are artificially produced every year. These under¬ 
ground caves and tunnels are abandoned quarries from 
which white building stone and plaster have been exca¬ 
vated, and as the veins of stone permeated through the 
bowels of the earth, 40 to 125 feet deep, so were they 
quarried, and the blocks brought to the surface through 
vertical shafts. It is these tunnels, varying in height 
and width as the veins of stone varied, that are now used 
for mushroom-growing. M. Lachaume, in his book, 
The Cave Mushroom , tells us : “In the Department of 
the Seine there are 3000 quarries ; those which have been 
abandoned and which are situated close to Paris at 
Montrouge, Bagneux, Vaugirard, Mery, Chatillon, Vitry, 
Honilles, and St. Denis, are used by the 250 mushroom- 
growers of the Department. There are several of these 
quarries with horizontal galleries driven into the calca¬ 
reous rock from the level of the road, which are mostly 
large enough to accommodate a good sized cart, but the 
majority can only be entered, like many coal mines, by 
vertical shafts 100 to 125 feet deep, down which every¬ 
thing has to pass. The laborers climb up and down a 
ladder, and the fresh manure is shoveled down the shaft 
from above, the waste stuff and mushrooms being hauled 
up in baskets from beneath by means of a windlass.” 
The manure used is obtained from the Paris stables 
and furnished by contractors, with whom the mushroom 
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