Toadstools, mushrooms, fungi, edible and poisonous; one thousand American fungi / How to select and cook the edible; how to distinguish and avoid the poisonous, with full botanic descriptions. Toadstool poisons and their treatment, instructions to students, recipes for cooking, etc., etc.

by Charles McIlvaine; Robert K. Macadam

P. muta´bilis Schaeff.—changeable. Pileus about 2 in. broad, cinnamon when moist, becoming pale when dry, hygrophanous, slightly fleshy, convex then flattened, commonly obtusely umbonate, sometimes depressed, even and smooth, but when young occasionally scaly throughout. Stem about 2–3 in. long, 2 lines and more thick, rigid, stuffed then hollow, equal or attenuated downward, scaly-rough as far as the ring, rust-color, blackish or umber downward, often ascending or twisted. Ring membranaceous, externally scaly. Gills adnato-decurrent, crowded, rather broad, pallid then cinnamon. Stevenson.

Densely cespitose, variable in stature.

Spores ellipsoid-obovate, 6×11µ W.G.S.; 7×4µ W.P; 9–11×5–6µ Massee; 11×7µ Morgan.

Edible. Curtis. Considered excellent in Europe.

P. margina´ta Batsch.—marginatus, margined. Pileus 1 in. and more broad, honey-colored when moist, tan when dry, hygrophanous, slightly fleshy, convex then expanded, obtuse, even, smooth, margin striate. Stem about 2 in. long, 1–2 lines thick, tubed, equal, fibrillose or slightly striate, not scaly, of the same color as the pileus, but becoming dingy-brown, and commonly white velvety at the base. Ring 1–2 lines distant from the apex, often in the form of a cortina and fugacious. Gills adnate, crowded, thin, narrow, at first pallid, then darker cinnamon.

It varies much, and is deceptive on account of the vanishing veil. In hedges there is a very small cespitose form with the pileus only ½ in. broad, and the stem tough and smooth, with exception of the remains of the fugacious cortina. There also occur on the ground among mosses smaller and paler forms, which must be carefully distinguished from A. unicolor, etc. Stevenson.

Spores 7–8×4µ Massee.

Haddonfield, N.J., November, December, 1896. In pine woods. McIlvaine.

The caps of this small Pholiota, seldom over 1 ½ in. across, can be gathered in goodly numbers where it frequents. They are of excellent quality.

P. dis´color Pk.—changing color. Pileus thin, convex, then expanded or slightly depressed, smooth, viscid, hygrophanous, watery-cinnamon and striatulate on the margin when moist; bright ochraceous-yellow when dry. Lamellæ close, narrow, pallid then pale rust-color. Stem equal, hollow, fibrillose-striate, pallid. Ring distinct, persistent. Spores elliptical, 7×5µ.