This, which is one of the most delicate funguses, fortunately is not rare in England. In Italy it is in equal request with the _Amanita Cæsarea_; in France it is also in high esteem,—“servie sur toutes les tables, elle est bonne à toute sauce” (_Thore_); and were its excellent qualities better known here, they could not fail to secure it a general reception into our best kitchens, and a frequent place among our side-dishes at table. The beauty and remarkable appearance of this Agaric have procured for it a variety of names: _colubrinus_, from the snake-like markings on the stem; _clypeatus_, from its umbonated top; ‘_fungo parasole_,’ from the orbicular form of the wide-spread pileus; and _Gambaltiem_ or _Fonz de la gamba lunga_, from the extraordinary height of the stalk. Autumn is the time of its greatest abundance, but individual specimens occur occasionally throughout the summer. It grows solitary or few together in hedgebanks and pasture-grounds. The pileus, which is commonly from four to four and a half inches across, sometimes attains a width of six or seven. At first it is concealed in a volva, but breaking from this it goes through a variety of forms, from that of an ovoid cone to that of a flattened disk. It is umbonated at the centre, and covered with scales, which are formed by the breaking up of the mud-coloured epidermis, and are large, raised, and persistent at the centre; thin, regular, and lighter in hue at the circumference, “the whole surface resembling a delightfully soft, shaggy-brown leather” (_Purton_). The flesh of the pileus is white and cottony, that of the stalk fibrous and somewhat brittle, with a subrubescent tinge, the whole plant turning to a rufous-orange when bruised; the gills are of a pale flesh-colour, occasionally forked, ventricose, denticulate, remote from the stalk, and having a circular pit between it and their central extremities, which are fixed into a kind of collar. The stalk tawny, striped circularly with bands of white, formed by the breaking up of the epidermis; is bulbous at the base and attenuated upwards; its apex rounded, and penetrating deeply through the flesh of the pileus (which receives it as in a socket), gives rise to the central umbo on the upper surface of the cap. The ring moveable, like that of an umbrella-stick, broad, compact, membranaceous immediately round the stalk, and fibrous towards its free margin, is white above and tawny or of the same colour as the stalk on its under surface. The smell is like that of newly-ground meal; the taste is pleasant; the spores are white and elliptic. The _Ag. excoriatus_ resembles the _Ag. procerus_ very closely, but is easily distinguished from it by its smaller size, the absence of the bulb at the base of the stalk, and the ring being often attached instead of free. Being equally esculent, the following receipts will serve for both:—