As there are some singular differences presented by this fungus in regard to development, odour, taste, and the colour of the spores, which seem almost sufficient to entitle it to be divided into two distinct species, I shall first describe the more ordinary form, as given by Mr. Berkeley, and then mention the variations from it. “Imbricated, large; _pileus_ subdimidiate, very thick and fleshy; flesh white, dusky towards the surface; one inch deep, the border at first fibrillose; margin involute, as the pileus expands the white fibrillæ vanish, and the colour changes to bistre; margin paler and rimulose, the whole surface shining and satiny when dry, soft and clammy when moist; _gills_ broad, here and there forked,”[174] standing out sharp and erect like the fine flutings of a column, winding down the stalk to different lengths, and those that reach the bottom forming there a beautiful raised meshwork highly characteristic of this species, “_dirty_ (pure?) white, the edge serrated, umber; _taste_ and _smell_ like that of _Ag. personatus_, which it resembles somewhat in colour;” “_spores_ white like those of the _Polyporus suaveolens_.”[175] The points of difference in those which departed from the ordinary type were as follows:[176]—first, in specimens growing close together and all equally exposed to the light, the colour of all at the same period of growth was not the same, being a delicate waxy-white in some of the specimens, in others, a light-brown. Secondly, whereas this fungus is generally “invested during infancy with a _white lanugo or down_,”[177] I observed the young Agarics, which presented themselves at first as small semitransparent eminences rising irregularly from a common stalk, and not unlike in appearance the blisters on a chalcedony, to be thickly coated with a light-blue varnish in place of it; the dry _débris_ of which varnish continued to adhere to the surface of the pileus for some time afterwards. Thirdly, the complexion of the spores, commonly described as _white_, was in these specimens pale-rose. Fourthly, they exhaled the strong and peculiar odour of Tarragon; and, finally, in place of being the delicate fungus at table which in July I had always found it, these specimens afforded a distasteful food. The _Ag. ostreatus_ resists cold in a remarkable manner; the circumstance of its being found in winter has procured for it the trivial name of Gelon. _Ag. ostreatus_ is found on the barks of many sorts of trees, and wherever it has once been it is apt to recur frequently afterwards. It may be dressed in any of the more usual ways; but as the flesh is rather over-solid and tenacious, it is all the better for being cooked leisurely over a slow fire. AGARICUS RUBESCENS, _Persoon_. PLATE XI. FIGS. 3, 4, AND 5. Subgenus 1. AMANITA. “Non altrimenti del Cesareo delicato e sano.”—_Vitt._