The following case is recorded in the Medical Transactions, vol. ii.
"A middle-aged man having gathered what he called champignons, they were stewed, and eaten by himself and his wife; their child also, about four years old, ate a little of them, and the sippets of bread which were put into the liquor. Within five minutes after eating them, the man began to stare in an unusual manner, and was unable to shut his eyes. All objects appeared to him coloured with a variety of colours. He felt a palpitation in what he called his stomach; and was so giddy, that he could hardly stand. He seemed to himself swelled all over his body. He hardly knew what he did or said; and sometimes was unable to speak at all. These symptoms continued in a greater or less degree for twenty-four hours; after which, he felt little or no disorder. Soon after he perceived himself ill, one scruple of white vitriol was given him, and repeated two or three times, with which he vomited plentifully.
"The woman, aged thirty-nine, felt all the same symptoms, but in a higher degree. She totally lost her voice and her senses, and was either stupid, or so furious that it was necessary she should be held. The white vitriol was offered to her, of which she was capable of taking but very little; however, after four or five hours, she was much recovered: but she continued many days far from being well, and from enjoying her former health and strength. She frequently fainted for the first week after; and there was, during a month longer, an uneasy sense of heat and weight in her breast, stomach, and bowels, with great flatulence. Her head was, at first waking, much confused; and she often experienced palpitations, tremblings, and other hysteric affections, to all which she had ever before been a stranger.
"The child had some convulsive agitations of his arms, but was otherwise little affected. He was capable of taking half a scruple of ipecacuanha, with which he vomited, and was soon perfectly recovered."
The edible mushroom is the basis of the sauce called mushroom catsup; a great proportion of which is prepared by gardeners who grow the fungi. The mushrooms employed for preparing this sauce are generally those which are in a putrefactive state, and not having found a ready sale in the market; for no vegetable substance is liable to so rapid a spontaneous decomposition as mushrooms. In a few days after the fungus has been removed from the dung-bed on which it grows, it becomes the habitation of myriads of insects; and, if even the saleable mushroom be attentively examined, it will frequently be found to swarm with life.
FOOTNOTES:
[114] Fungi plerique veneno turgent. Linn. Amæn. Acad.
[115] Quæ voluptas tanta ancipitis cibi?—Plin. Nat. Hist. xxii. 23.
[116] Sen. Ep. 95.