The deadly _Amanita_ or death-cup (_A. phalloides_) is probably responsible for the majority of cases of mushroom poisoning. Ford estimates that from twelve to fifteen deaths occur annually in this country from this species alone. This fungus is usually eaten through sheer ignorance by persons who have gathered and eaten whatever they chanced to find in the woods. A few of these poisonous mushrooms mixed with edible varieties may be sufficient to cause the death of a family. Ford thus describes the symptoms of poisoning with _A. phalloides_: Following the consumption of the fungi there is a period of six to fifteen hours during which no symptoms of poisoning are shown by the victims. This corresponds to the period of incubation of other intoxications or infections. The first sign of trouble is sudden pain of the greatest intensity localized in the abdomen, accompanied by vomiting, thirst, and choleraic diarrhoea with mucous and bloody stools. The latter symptom is by no means constant. The pain continues in paroxysms often so severe as to cause the peculiar Hippocratic facies, _la face vultueuse_ of the French, and though sometimes ameliorated in character, it usually recurs with greater severity. The patients rapidly lose strength and flesh, their complexion assuming a peculiar yellow tone. After three to four days in children and six to eight in adults the victims sink into a profound coma from which they cannot be roused and death soon ends the fearful and useless tragedy. Convulsions rarely if ever occur and when present indicate, I am inclined to believe, a mixed intoxication, specimens of _Amanita muscaria_ being eaten with the _phalloides_. The majority of individuals poisoned by the "deadly Amanita" die, the mortality varying from 60 to 100 per cent in various accidents, but recovery is not impossible when small amounts of the fungus are eaten, especially if the stomach be very promptly emptied, either naturally or artificially. A number of other closely related species of _Amanita_ (e.g., _A. verna_, the "destroying angel," probably a small form of _A. phalloides_) have a poisonous action similar to that of _A. phalloides_. All are different from muscarin. [Illustration: FIG. 4.--Death-cup; destroying angel (_Amanita phalloides_ Fries); reduced; natural size: cap, 3-1/2 inches; stem, 7-1/2 inches. (After Marshall, _The Mushroom Book_, by courtesy of Doubleday, Page & Company.)]