Here is a very ordinary-looking specimen growing beside the stone steps at our back door perhaps. Its top is gray; its gills beneath are fawn-color. We may shake it as rudely as we will, and yet we shall get no response such as the puff-ball will give us. But let us lay it upon a piece of white paper, gills downward, on the mantel, and cover it with a tumbler or finger-bowl, so as to absolutely exclude the least admission of air. At the expiration of five minutes, perhaps, we may detect a filmy, pinkish-yellow tint on the paper, following beneath the upraised border of the cap, like a shadow faintly lined with white. In a quarter of an hour the tinted deposit is perceptible across the room; and in an hour, if we carefully raise the mushroom, the perfect spore-print is revealed in all its beauty--a pink-brown disk with a white centre, which represents the point of contact of the cut stem, and white radiating lines, representing the edges of the thin gills, many of them as fine and delicate as a cobweb. [Illustration: Spore Surface of an Agaric] Every fresh species will yield its surprise in the markings and color of the prints. These spore-deposits are of course fugitive, and will easily rub off at the slightest touch. But inasmuch as many of these specimens, either from their beauty of form or exquisite color, or for educational or scientific purposes, it will be desirable to preserve, I append simple rules for the making of the prints by a process by which they will become effectually "fixed," and thus easily kept without injury. DIRECTIONS FOR MAKING A MUSHROOM SPORE-PRINT Take a piece of smooth white writing-paper and coat its surface evenly with a thin solution of gum-arabic, dextrine, or other mucilage, and allow it to dry. Pin this, gummed side uppermost, to a board or table, preferably over a soft cloth, so that it will lie perfectly flat. To insure a good print the mushroom specimen should be fresh and firm, and the gills or spore-surface free from breaks or bruises. Cut the stem off about level with the gills, then lay the mushroom, spore-surface downward, upon the paper, and cover with a tumbler, finger-bowl, or other vessel with a smooth, even rim, to absolutely exclude the slightest ingress of air.