_Agaricus (Amanita) muscarius_
[Sidenote: =A deceptive Amanita=]
This, one of the most strikingly beautiful of our toadstools, is
figured in Plate 4. Its brilliant cap of yellow, orange, or even
scarlet, studded with white or grayish raised spots, can hardly be
unfamiliar to even the least observant country walker. Its favorite
habitat is the woods, and, in the writer's experience especially,
beneath hemlocks and poplars, where he has seen this species year after
year in whole companies, and in all stages shown in the plate at the
same time, from the globular young specimen almost covered with its
white warts just lifting its head above the brown carpet to the fully
expanded individual, in which the spots have assumed a shrunken and
brownish tint.
[Sidenote: =Used as a fly-poison=]
[Sidenote: =Its obscure cup=]
The consideration of this species is of the _utmost importance_, as
its beauty is but an alluring mask, which has enticed many to their
destruction; among the more recent of its conspicuous victims having
been the Czar Alexis of Russia. For this is another cosmopolitan type
of mushroom, common alike in America, Great Britain, Europe, and Asia,
in all of which countries it is notorious for its poisonous resources.
It is commonly known as the "Fly-agaric," its substance macerated in
milk having been employed for centuries as an effectual fly-poison.
After the reader's introduction to the botanical character of the
Amanita, he would, presumably, be somewhat suspicious of the present
species. The suggestive white or dingy fragments upon its cap, it
is true, would alone arouse his suspicions, but in the examination
of the stem for the telltale volva or cup its verification might be
somewhat in doubt. It is for this reason that the species is emphasized
in these pages, as the _Amanita muscarius_, judging from the great
dissimilarity of its numerous portraits from all countries, would seem
to be remarkably protean, especially with reference to its stalk. The
majority of the portraits of this reprobate presents the volva as
distinct and as clean cut as in the _A. vernus_ just described, and the
stalk above as equally smooth, features which are usually at variance
with the associated botanical description of the species, which often
characterizes the volva as "incomplete" or "obscure," and the stem as
"rough and scaly." If the portraits in these works are correct, the
Amanita qualities of the species are clearly displayed, but if their
accompanying descriptions are to be credited, and such seem to be in
perfect accord with the specimens which I have always found, the _A.
muscarius_ would seem in need of a more authentic historian.
[Illustration: Amanita muscaria]
_PLATE IV_