_Boletus scaber_
This is a very common mushroom in our woods all through the summer and
autumn, in reasonably moist weather. It is figured in Plate 21. The cap
of an average specimen expands four inches or more, is of a brown or
brownish buff color, and viscid when moist. The pore-surface is _dingy
white_, the _tube_ orifices being quite _minute_ and _round_--not so
conspicuously angular or honey-combed as in other species--and with
occasional reddish stains, presumably a deposit from the floating
_spores_, which are _tawny reddish_. The flesh is dirty white, the stem
solid, contracting upwards, and rough with fibrous _brownish scaly_
points--whence the name "_scaber_"--often arranged somewhat in vertical
lines. Epicures fail to agree as to the esculent qualities of this
mushroom. It is certainly inferior to the _edulis_.