"Waal, then, I'll say good-bye to ye," he responds, with emphasis. "Why, don't ye know them's tudstools, 'n' they'll kill ye as sartin as pizen? I wonder they ain't fetched ye afore this. You never larned tew tell mushrooms. My father et 'em all his life, and so hev I, 'n' I know 'em. Come up into my garden yender 'n' I'll show ye haow to tell the reel mushroom. There's a lot of 'em thar in the hot-bed naow. Come along. I'll give ye a mess on 'em if ye'll only throw them pizen things away."
"And how do you know that those in your garden are real mushrooms?" I inquire.
"Why, they ain't anything like them o' yourn. They're pink and black underneath, and peel up from the edge."
"How many kinds of mushrooms are there, do you suppose?" I ask.
"They's only the one kind; all the others is tudstools and pizen. It's easy to tell the reel mushroom. Come up and I'll show ye. Don't eat them things, I beg on ye! I vaow they'll kill ye!"
At this point he catches a glimpse of a Shaggy-mane mushroom, which comes to light as I tenderly fondle the specimens, and which is evidently recognized as an acquaintance.
"What!" he exclaims, in pale alarm. "Ye ain't goin' t' eat them too?"
"Oh yes I am, this very evening," I respond. "I think I'll try them first."
A rustic authority
"Why, man, yure crazy! You don't know nothin' about 'em. I'd as soon think o' eatin' pizen outright. Them's what we call black-slime tudstools. They come up out o' manure. I've seen my muck-heap in my barnyard covered with the nasty things time 'n' ag'in. They look nice 'n' white naow, but they rot into the onsiteliest black mess ye ever see. I know wut I'm sayin'. Ye can't tell me nothin' 'baout them tudstools! They keep comin' up along my barn-fence all thro' the fall—bushels of 'em."