Mushrooms and Their Use

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1897 edition. Excerpt: ...therefore the collar is absent from the stem in species of Cortinarius, though sometimes a few filaments adhere to the stem, and by the lodgment of the falling spores upon them, a rusty-brownish stain is occasionally seen about the stem instead of a collar. The mature gills in nearly or quite all the species are dusted bv, and correspond to the spores in color, but in the young plants the color is almost always quite different. Tt is, therefore, very impoitant to know the color of the gills in the young plant in order to identify the species of this genus. The gills are attached to the stem in all the species. The Violet cortinarius, C. violaceus, is a beautiful mushroom, and one of the most easily recognized species of the genus. The whole plant, when young, is of a dark violaceous color without and within. The cap is usually well formed and beautifully adorned with numerous minute hairy tufts or scales. The gills are at first of the same color, but when old they become dusted with the spores, and have their color modified accordingly. The stem is rather long and more or less bulbous or thickened at the base. The cap is generally two cortinarusvioucens, c. coiiinitus. to four inches broad, and the stem three to five inches long, and a half inch or more thick. It grows in woods in hilly or mountainous districts, and may be found from July to September. It is solitary or scattered in its mode of growth, and not very plentiful. It retains its color somewhat when cooked, and in consequence, the dish of Violet mushrooms is scarcely as attractive to the eyes as it is to the palate. The Smeared cortinarius, C. collinitus, is much more common than the preceding species, and has a much wider range. As its name indicates, both cap and stem are...