A plain easy account of British fungi : with descriptions of the esculent and poisonous species.

  • Cooke, M. C. (Mordecai Cubitt), 1825-1914.
Date:
1862
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A plain easy account of British fungi : with descriptions of the esculent and poisonous species. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    pumpkin during the night; and Dr. Lindley has computed that the cells of which its structure is com- posed have multiplied at the extraordinary rate of sixty millions in a minute. Dr. Greville mentions an instance of one of the largest of our British fungi (Polyporus squamosus) attaining a circumference of seven feet five inches, and weighing thirty-four pounds, after having been cut four days. It was only four weeks in attaining to these dimensions, thus acquiring an increase of growth equal to nineteen ounces per day. During, the past summer we noticed an individual of this same species which reached a diameter of eleven inches within the short space of a week. Blue-mould is also rapid in its growth, although the plant indivi- dually is small, and a meadow or pasture which in the evening exhibited no prominent signs of mushrooms, may in the morning yield a good basket-full. The popular notion, current in some agricultural districts, that fungi melt away when the sun shines upon them, sends the mushroom-gatherer to seek them “ When the grass is wet with dew. In the morning early.” Dr. Carpenter relates an instance of the expansive power resulting from the rapid growth of the soft cellular tissue of fungi which seems marvellous. Some years ago the town of Basingstoke was paved; and not many months afterwards the pavement was observed to exhibit an unevenness which could not easily be ac- counted for. In a short time after, the mystery was explained, for some of the heaviest stones were com-