Part 9

=Pileus:= Rounded convex; diameter two to five inches; surface occasionally smooth and viscid when moist; color usually brownish red, but varying from orange brick red or even black in certain varieties to yellow or whitish.

=Tube surface:= Rounded, cushion-like; whitish at first, becoming dingy; tube openings small and round, and rather long as seen in section.

=Spores:= Reddish brown.

=Stem:= Solid, dingy white, tapering slightly above, more or less thickly beset with brownish, fibrous, dot-like scales, this being the most pronounced botanical character for identification.

=Flesh:= White or dingy in certain varieties, often changing to blue, brown, pinkish, or black where wounded.

=Taste:= Negatively pleasant.

=Habitat:= A common and widely distributed species, with many variations of color. Found in woods and shaded waste-places.

=Season:= July-October.

PLATE XXI

ROUGH-STEMMED BOLETUS

_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_.

THE YELLOW-CRACKED BOLETUS

_Boletus subtomentosus_

[Sidenote: =Specific qualities=]

The general contour of the present species--_B. subtomentosus_ (Plate 22, fig. 1)--resembles the foregoing, but it is easily distinguished by the color of its cap and tube surface, the pileus being usually olive, olive-brown, or red of various shades; the color, however, does not extend to the flesh beneath the peeled cuticle, as in _B. chrysenteron_, Fig. 2. The surface is soft and dry--subtomentous--to the touch. Cracks in the cap become yellow, on which account this species is called the "yellow-cracked Boletus," in contradistinction to the red-cracked _B. chrysenteron_. Its most important distinction, however, is of a chemical nature.

[Sidenote: =The blue stain=]

The stem is stout, unequal, firm, yellowish, and more or less ribbed, occasionally tinted, minutely dotted, or faintly striped with the color of the cap. The taste of the flesh is sweet and agreeable. Palmer compares it to the flavor of walnuts. The tube surface is _yellow or yellowish green_, and the _tubes and yellowish flesh of cap and stem turn a rich peacock-blue immediately on fracture, becoming deeper_ moment by moment until the entire exposed portion becomes leaden--especially noticeable in mature specimens. The pore surface shows a similar blue stain whenever bruised. The tubes are angular-sided instead of round, and much larger than in the _B. edulis_; spores ochre colored.

[Sidenote: =An unwarranted stigma=]

This blue stain was formerly, and is even now, deemed sufficient with many mycophagists to place this mushroom on the black-list, but is believed by Mr. Palmer and Mr. McIlvaine to be unwarranted as a stigma, assuming that fresh specimens are employed. The _B. subtomentosus_ is also among the eleven edible Boleti in the list of Dr. Curtis, given on a previous page, and the present author has habitually eaten the species with enjoyment and without unpleasant results. Fresh young specimens with the least change of color would perhaps be the wiser choice for the novice.

_PLATE XXII_

YELLOW CRACKED BOLETUS

1. =Boletus subtomentosus=

=Pileus:= Diameter three to six inches. Color, varying in different individuals, yellowish brown, olive, or subdued tan color; epidermis soft and dry, with a fine pubescence. Cracks in surface become yellow.

=Flesh:= Creamy white in mature specimens, changing to blue, and at length leaden on fracture.

=Tube surface:= Yellow or yellowish green, becoming bluish when bruised; opening of tubes large and angled.

=Stem:= Stout; yellowish; minutely roughened with scurfy dots, or faintly striped with brown.

=Spores:= Brownish ochre.

=Taste=: Sweet and agreeable.

=Habitat:= Woods.

=Season=: Summer and autumn.

GOLDEN-FLESH BOLETUS

2. =Boletus chrysenteron=

=Pileus:= Diameter two to four inches; convex, becoming more flattened; soft to the touch, varying from light yellowish brown to bright brick red; more or less fissured with red cracks and clincks.

=Flesh:= Rich, bright yellow, red immediately beneath the cuticle.

=Tube surface:= Olive-yellow, becoming bluish where bruised; tube openings rather large, angled, and unequal in size.

=Stem:= Generally stout and straight; yellowish, and more or less streaked or spotted with the color of the cap.

=Spores:= Light brown.

=Habitat:= Woods and copses.

=Season:= Summer and autumn.

PLATE XXII

Another species having this peculiar property of "turning blue" even in a more marked degree, and named, in consequence, the _B. cyanescens_, though always heretofore considered poisonous, is now pronounced by certain prominent mycophagists to be not only harmless but esculent. It is still advisable, however, to caution moderation in its use as food, if only on the ground of idiosyncrasy. The spores of this species are _white_, which, with the more minute tube openings, form a sufficient discrimination from _subtomentosus_. The spores should be obtained by a deposit on black or dark-colored paper. The flesh is white also. Other blue-stain species, such as _B. alveolatus_ (Plate 24), are still considered with suspicion, presumably groundless.

YELLOW-FLESHED BOLETUS

_Boletus chrysenteron_

Among the toadstools which tradition would surely brand as poisonous on account of "bright color" is the common species whose name heads this paragraph, and which is illustrated in Plate 22, fig. 2. In its various shapes it suggests the preceding varieties. Its cap, however, is brownish red, often bright _brick red_. _Flesh almost lemon-yellow_, stained _red just beneath_ the cuticle, and _not noticeably changeable_ on fracture. _Tube surface yellowish green_, turning blue or bluish green when bruised. Spores light brown. _Tubes_ rather _large_, angular, and _unequal in shape of aperture_. Stem yellow, often brightly colored with the red of the cap. Chance cracks in its surface become red, whence the common name of the "Red-cracked Boletus." A species frequent in woods throughout the summer and autumn, and edible.

In its brightly colored cap it might possibly be superficially confounded with the suspicious _Boletus alveolatus_ of Plate 24. But the latter species is easily distinguished by its rose-colored spores and red pore surface.

CONE-LIKE BOLETUS

_Strobilomyces strobilaceus_

[Sidenote: =Botanical characters=]

Another allied species, not especially famous for its esculent qualities, but which is, nevertheless, not to be despised, is here introduced on account of its especially pronounced character (Plate 23)--the cone-like Boletus, or, more properly, Strobilomyces. It is of a brownish gray color, its shaggy surface more or less studded with deep brown or black woolly points, each at the centre of a scale-like segment. The tubes beneath are covered by the veil in the younger specimens, but this at length breaks, leaving ragged fragments hanging from the rim of the pileus. The pore surface thus exposed is at first a grayish white, ultimately becoming brown. The substance of the fungus turns red when broken or cut.

This very striking mushroom is found in woods, especially under evergreens. It frequently attains a diameter of four inches. Its spores are a deep brown, and a specimen selected at the stage when the under surface is _flat_ will yield a most beautiful spore print if laid upon white paper and protected from the atmosphere, as described in a later chapter.

_PLATE XXIII_

THE CONE-LIKE BOLETUS

=Strobilomyces strobilaceus=

=Pileus:= From two to four inches in diameter, covered with a soft gray wool drawn into regular cone-like points tipped with dark brown.

Flesh grayish white, turning red when bruised.

=Pore surface:= Grayish white in young specimen, and then usually covered with the veil; dark brown or almost black at maturity. Plate 38 shows a spore-print of this species.

=Spores:= Very dark brown.

=Taste:= Negatively pleasant.

=Odor:= Sweet and mild.

=Habitat:= Woods; singly or in small clusters.

PLATE XXIII

[Sidenote: =Black spore-prints=]

A reproduction of one of these prints is shown in Plate 38, the white reticulation representing the contact of the tube orifices with the paper, each tube depositing its dot composed of spores, the depth of color increasing in proportion to the time involved in the deposit. A single mushroom will yield a half-dozen or more prints. This fungus dries readily, and may be kept indefinitely.

SUSPICIOUS BOLETI

_Boletus felleus--B. alveolatus_

[Sidenote: =Maligned species=]

[Sidenote: =A daring pioneer mycophagist=]

In Plate 24 are shown two examples of the Boleti which have commonly been accounted poisonous--_B. felleus_ and _B. alveolatus_--and, in the absence of absolutely satisfactory assurance to the contrary, it is safer from our present point of view to consider them still as suspicious and to give them a wide berth. There can be no doubt but that the popular condemnation of the Boleti has been altogether too sweeping. The gradual accession of many questionable species to the edible list of Messrs. McIlvaine and Palmer and other daring mycophagists is a sufficient attestation of this fact. Thus _subtomentosus_ and _cyanescens_, already described, always heretofore branded as reprobates, are now redeemed from obloquy, and even the universal ill-repute of the _B. satanas_, with its pale pileus and blood-red pores, has not frightened the indefatigable Captain McIlvaine from a personal challenge and encounter with this lurid specimen, with the result that the formidable "Satanas" has proved anything but deserving of its name--not half so lurid as it has been painted; indeed, it has been even pronounced "the best of them all." Of course there's no telling to what extent the considerations of contrast, through surprise and the consequent demoralization on the contingents of the personal equation, may have influenced the captain's discrimination, but it certainly would appear, to put it negatively, that even the ill-favored world-renowned _B. satanas_ has apparently been freed from aspersion as an enemy of mankind.

But it is well for the amateur to avoid these notorious species absolutely until their edibility becomes universally accepted by the "professionals."

[Sidenote: =The bitter Boletus=]

The _Boletus felleus_ (Plate 24, fig. 1) is a very common species. The pinkish substance of this Boletus is so extremely bitter when raw as to make it sufficiently repellent as food. The color of its smooth cap varies from creamy yellow to reddish brown. Substance white in young specimens, flesh color or pinkish in older individuals. Tube surface white at first, becoming pinkish. Opening of tubes, angled. Stem usually more or less netted with raised lines towards cap. Spores pinkish or "flesh colored." Common in rich soil in woods.

_PLATE XXIV_

SUSPICIOUS BOLETI

=Alveolate Boletus--Boletus alveolatus=

=Pileus:= Smooth, polished; bright, deep crimson or maroon, occasionally mottled or marbled with yellowish; three to six inches in diameter.

=Flesh:= Firm and solid in substance; pale greenish or yellowish white, changing blue in fracture or where bruised.

=Tubes:= Tube-surface reaching the stem proper; undulate with uneven hollows; maroon, the tubes in section being yellow beyond their dark red mouths.

=Spores:= Yellowish brown.

=Stem:= Usually disproportionately long, covered with depressions or oblong pitted indentations, with intermediate coarse network of raised ridges; red and yellow.

=Habitat:= Woods; quite common.

=Bitter Boletus--Boletus felleus=

=Pileus:= At first firm in substance, becoming soft and cushion-like; smooth, without polish, varying in color from pale ochre to yellowish or reddish brown; diameter three to nine inches.

=Flesh:= White on immediate section, generally changing to slight pinkish or flesh color in fracture.

=Tubes:= Tube-surface rounded upward as it reaches stem; white at first, becoming dull pinkish with age, or upon being bruised.

=Spores:= Flesh colored or dull pink.

=Stem:= Usually quite stout, nearly as smooth as the cap, and somewhat lighter in color; more or less ridged with coarse reticulations, occasionally covered with them to its thickened base.

=Taste:= Bitter.

=Habitat:= Rich woods and copses, often about decaying trunks.

PLATE XXIV

[Sidenote: =The crimson Boletus=]

_Boletus alveolatus_.--Pileus smooth and polished, usually rich crimson or maroon, sometimes varied with paler yellowish tints. Substance very solid, changing to blue on fracture or bruise. Tube surface deep dull crimson or maroon, this color not extending the full length of the pores, which are yellow a short distance above their mouths. The stem is quite stout and tall for the size of the cap as compared with other Boleti. It is mottled in yellow and bright red or crimson, and conspicuously meshed with a network of firm ridges. The spores are yellowish brown. A conspicuous and easily identified species.

THE VEGETABLE BEEFSTEAK

_Fistulina hepatica_

[Sidenote: =Botanical characters=]

Our next member of the Polyporus order, or tube-bearing fungi, is a unique member of the fungus tribe, and cannot be mistaken for any other species. An example of this species is shown in Plate 25, the _beefsteak_ mushroom--_Fistulina hepatica_. The specimen from which my drawing was made was found growing at the foot of a chestnut-tree, and was about nine inches across by about two in greatest thickness. Its upper surface was dark meaty red or liver colored, somewhat wet, or viscid and clammy, and its taste slightly acid. The under tube surface was yellowish white, and, as the section will show, was proportionately thin--the pores being about one-eighth of an inch in length. The solid red substance much resembled meat, and in sections was streaked with darker lines of red, as indicated in plate, somewhat suggesting a section of beet-root.

[Sidenote: =Savory qualities=]

Though not common in my vicinity, I nevertheless succeed in obtaining a few specimens during the season. It varies greatly in size and shape. M. C. Cooke, in his admirable "plain and easy" account of British fungi, says of it: "When old it affords an excellent gravy, and when young, if sliced and grilled, would pass for a good beefsteak. Specimens are now and then met with that would furnish four or five men with a good dinner, and they have been collected weighing as much as thirty pounds. The liver, or paler pinkish meaty color, clammy viscidity, and streaky section are sufficient guides in the recognition of this species."

[Sidenote: =Culinary preparation=]

It is a highly prized article of diet on the Continent where the arts of the chef are ingeniously employed in endless recipes for its savory preparation, often, it would seem, with the main object of obliterating as far as possible all trace of the delicate flavor of the mushroom _per se_.

If the reader's experience correspond with the writer's in his mycological experiments "_à la mode_" he will gladly fall back to the plain plebeian method of simply broiling over the coals, or frying or roasting in the pan, with the least possible seasoning of pepper, salt, and butter, relying upon his mushroom to furnish the predominant zest and flavor.

Other hints for serving this fungus are given in a later chapter. Besides the common name of "beefsteak mushroom," it is also known on the Continent as the "oak tongue," and "chestnut tongue."

_PLATE XXV_

THE BEEFSTEAK MUSHROOM

=Fistulina hepatica=

=Pileus:= Diameter, average specimen, about six inches, occasionally twice or three times this size; color varying from pinkish to dark meaty red; surface roughened with minute papillæ; soft and moist.

=Flesh:= Light red, streaked with darker red; tender and juicy in young specimens; juice light red.

=Tube surface:= Creamy in color; tubes distinct from each other, crowded, very short, as shown in section opposite.

=Stem:= Short or obsolete, growing at the side.

=Taste:= Slightly acid.

=Habitat:= On the stumps and trunks of oak and chestnut trees.

=Season:= July-September.

PLATE XXV

THE SULPHUROUS POLYPORUS

_Polyporus sulphureus_

Probably the most conspicuous member of our native polyporei remains to be considered among the esculents, though until recently it was included in the black list, Dr. Curtis, of North Carolina, I believe, having first demonstrated its edibility, though pronouncing it merely "tolerable."

The brilliancy of its sulphur-yellow and orange-salmon colors, in association with its large size, renders it a most conspicuous object, especially from its habit of growing in dense clusters, often a number of such clusters in close contiguity upon a decaying stump or prostrate log, frequently so numerous and so crowded as to completely conceal the bark beneath, as shown in the accompanying figure, or completely covering; a space of several square feet.

There lies before me even as I write a fragment of a single cluster which I plucked yesterday from the trunk of an apparently healthy red-oak near my studio, the remainder of the clump having been enjoyed as a special course in my dinner of last evening. In Plate 26 I present a portrait of this specimen, the well-named Sulphur Polyporus--_Polyporus sulphureus_. It may be found frequently from July till frost upon its favorite habitat of old trunk, stump, log water-trough, or fencepost, usually upon wood in the early stages of decay. A single cluster will often measure a foot in diameter through its very solid mass of thickened pulpy branches, its early and esculent stage being thus compact with the subdivisions ascending from their common thick stem, the mass somewhat suggesting a cauliflower in shape, as shown in the illustration above.

The general color at this tender stage is pure sulphur-yellow, this being the ultimate _lower_ or spore surface now exposed by its upright position. The true upper surface or cap of the later eccentrically branched fungus is of a bright orange-salmon color, and is mostly concealed by the crowded growth.

[Sidenote: =A voice in the wilderness=]

The specimen above alluded to would have weighed about two pounds, and this central mass was so crowded as to afford scarcely a glimpse of the pinkish-orange pileus surface. Upon showing my specimen to a friend, I was informed that a certain log by the roadside about two miles distant was covered with this same kind of fungus, which seemed to be spreading all over the ground. Doubtless ten or twenty pounds of good nourishing food was thus going begging by the way-side, even in sight of a rural homestead, whose lord and master finds the butcher's bill a serious drain upon his resources.

My plate shows a more open cluster of the fungus in its earlier stages, the _only_ time when it is fit for food. In this condition it is tender, succulent, and juicy. In a few days the lobed fringes or fan-like divisions have lowered and spread out as widely as their crowded condition will permit, assuming the horizontal or even drooping position seen at C, and at D in the plate, as viewed from above. The pileus now being exposed, the fungus presents a deep orange-red or salmon color to the beholder, its sulphurous-hued pore surface being turned beneath. Its texture at this adult stage is tough, fibrous, and almost woody, especially as it approaches the stem, and no one would think of eating it.

The young specimen, however, is quite delicious and wholesome, and, considering that a single cluster will afford a dinner for a large family, its importance as a food product, especially to the farmer or peasant who finds economy a necessity, is thus manifest. Tasted at the tip, it yields for the first moment of mastication an acid flavor recalling that of the _Fistulina hepatica_. This is followed by a sweet, slightly mucilaginous savor, which, in the realization that the species is wholesome, will at once prove an invitation to further experiment with the fungus as food.

[Sidenote: =Texture and quality=]

The texture of the young mushroom will be found to vary in its different parts, extremely tender at the thickened tuberculated tips, becoming fibrous as the stem is approached, and increasing in toughness, in fracture suggesting wood in appearance (see A, Plate 26), and unless the specimen is _very_ young this portion will have to be excluded from the diet. Excepting this precaution it needs no preparation for the table, assuming, of course, that the substance is free from grubs, which will presumably be the case, as I have never seen this fungus thus infested except in its more advanced woody growth.

[Sidenote: =Methods of cooking=]

I have not as yet satisfied myself as to the best methods of cooking this polyporus. Fried in butter it has a tendency to become slightly tough in consistency, in its white stringy fibre as well as in taste closely suggesting the "white meat" of chicken. It lends itself well to a stew or ragoût, and might, perhaps, to a curry, the substance being cut or broken in small pieces and treated after the manner of meat under similar recipes. Following the hints contained in our last chapter, many methods of its culinary treatment will suggest themselves.

_PLATE XXVI_

THE SULPHUROUS POLYPORUS

=Polyporus sulphureus=

In the mature specimen the growth is horizontal, spreading fan-like from stem, undulating with radiating flutings. Upper surface salmon orange or orange red, the edge being smooth and unevenly thickened with nodule-like prominences. In young specimen ascending, under yellow surface outwardly exposed.

=Pore Surface:= Bright sulphur yellow; pores very minute.

=Spores:= Dingy white.

=Stem:= Very short; a mere close attachment for the spreading growth.

=Taste:= Slightly acid and mucilaginous when raw; after cooking somewhat suggesting white meat of chicken.

=Odor:= Suggesting A. campestris.

=Habitat:=: On tree trunks, particularly oaks, often growing in very large clusters.

_A_. Section of fungus showing fibre.

_C_. and _D_. Matured specimen.

PLATE XXVI

[Sidenote: =Its ornamental attributes=]