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1 "Ex pituita." Fée thinks that under the name of "boleti," Pliny means exclusively agaries or mushrooms of the division Amanites, which contains both the best and the most noxious kinds—the oronge for instance, and the false oronge.
2 The Agaricus campestris of Linnæus, Feé thinks, our common field mushroom, or, possibly, the Agaricus deliciosus of Linnæus.
3 The Agaricus procerus of Schoofer, probably, the tall columelle, Fée thinks.
4 A cap worn by the Flamen; or chief-priest, of a somewhat conical shape; very similar in form to the Russian helmlet of the present day.
5 "Swine mushrooms." Fée suggests that this may be the Boletus edulis of Bullilard.
6 A valued friend of the philosopher Seneca, as we learn from Tacitus, and Seneca's Epistles, Ep. 63.
7 See Martial's Epigrams, 13. i. Ep. 21.
8 In B. xvi. c. 11. In that passage, however, the pine is mentioned, and not the beech.
9 In B. xx. c. 13, et passim.
10 Fée says that the fungi are but little used in modern medicine: the white bolet, he says, or larch bolet, is sometimes employed as a purgative, and some German writers have spoken in praise of the Bolecus suavcolens of Bulliard, as a remedy for pulmonary phthisis. The agaric known as amadue, or German tinder, is also employed in surgery. Fée remarks that all that Pliny says as to the medicinal properties of mushrooms and fungi is more or less hazardous.
11 Rheums, or catarrhs.
12 See B. xxxiv. c. 50.
13 "Sucinis novaculis." This may possibly mean "knives of amber;" and it is not improbable that the use of amber may have been thought a means of detecting the poisonous qualities of fungi.
14 This, as Fée remarks, is the case. All kinds of fungi, too, it is said, may be eaten with impunity, if first boiled in salt water.
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