your pages, I shall be gratified. I enclose, for your inspection, some specimens, which have now been prepared between three and four years, and which, you will, I think, allow, give a very fair idea of the Fúngi in their growing state. I am, Sir, yours, &c.

Clapham Road, Feb. 1834.

W. CHRISTY, Jun.

THE extreme difficulty of preserving Fúngi, so as to give any idea of their colours or forms, except by the cumbrous and expensive plan of putting them in spirits, must have struck every one who has paid any attention to this beautiful branch of botany. When on a visit, several years since, to my excellent friend Dr. Hooker of Glasgow, I became much interested with a mode which M. Klotzsch (who had then the care of the doctor's herbarium) adopted to preserve various Fúngi. M. Klotzsch was good enough to give me some lessons on his plan, by which, I am sorry to say, I have as yet profited little; but I have done at least enough to satisfy myself that it is not only practicable, but easy and very successful. Preserving Fúngi in spirits, besides the expense for spirit and glasses, is of little use as regards their colours; whereas the plan alluded to preserves the colours, in most instances, in their native brilliancy. M. Klotzsch published, I believe, an account of his plan in that valuable work the Botanical Miscellany; but as that work, from its comparatively high price, has a much less extensive circulation than your Magazine, I think I may be rendering a service to some of the lovers of Fúngi by communicating, through your pages, a sketch of the mode as known to myself.

The plan which, in pursuance of M. Klotzsch's instructions,

I have adopted, is as follows:-
With a sharp knife I divide

the fungus through the pileus
and stipes into two parts, one

rather larger than the other. From the inside of the larger

portion I take, in the same manner, a thin slice (fig. 28.), which thus affords a complete

vertical section of the fungus, showing the peculiarities in the structure of the stipes, pileus, and gills. The remaining portions are then to be treated as follows:- Carefully separate the pileus (fig. 29. a) from the

29

a

b

several times a day. the pieces of stipes on

stipes (b); scrape out the gills, and, where the fungus is very fleshy, remove also a portion of the solid part of the pileus. The vertical section, and the respective portions of pileus and stipes, are then to be placed in blotting-paper, and submitted to pressure, as is usual in drying plants. It is, however, advisable to expose them to the air for a short time, in order to wither them, and also to apply the pressure at first gently, as they are otherwise liable to split and crack. If the fungus is of a succulent nature, M. Klotzsch recommends drying them within the influence of the fire, and changing the papers When dry, the vertical section, with which are to be placed the respective portions of pileus, may be glued upon paper, and the whole will give a very good idea of the general appearance of the fungus. (fig. 30.)

Where a sufficiency of plants of a species occur, sections may be made of them in their different stages of growth, showing the various degrees of developement. (fig. 31.)

The very vivid colours of some Fúngi (Agaricus eméticus and others), are, in specimens dried in this manner, beautifully preserved, as well as the forms of some of the most fragile and delicate species.

The advantage which this mode of preservation possesses over all others, by enabling us to place the specimens in almost as little space as other plants in our herbaria, renders it worth the notice of all botanists.

I trust I have made myself intelligible; but any one desirous of farther information would doubtless find it in M. Klotzsch's paper. Not having the Botanical Miscellany at hand, I can only speak from memory; but I think the paper will be found in the fifth or sixth number of that work [Vol. ii. p. 159. t. lxxxiii.]

THE dried specimens of funguses sent by Mr. Christy are affixed to four tablets of paper, and are thereon named Agáricus squarròsus Müller, A. peronatus Bolt., A. eméticus Schaeff A. pratensis Pers. The place and time in which they were obtained are added: the time, as to the year, is 1830. Their appearance on the paper is very pleasing, and their characteristics seem most satisfactorily exhibited. A. squarròsus is illustrated by one specimen, very young; a vertical section of another, a little older; a profile of one full grown; and a vertical section of another full grown: this last shows the relative thickness of the pileus, the depth of the gills, and the structure of the stipes. A. peronatus is shown in two profiles and two vertical sections: A. eméticus by a profile and two vertical sections; the external colour of the pileus is a fine fulvous red: A. praténsis by two profiles, and four vertical sections of as many plants in progressive stages of growth. The condition of all the specimens proves the excellence of this mode of preparing them, and this must render a knowledge of it very useful to every student of Fungi. We hope to see a descriptive notice of it given in the volume on the funguses of Britain, now in preparation by Dr. Hooker: it will then be under the eye of every one who may endeavour, by the help of that work, to attain an acquaintance with these plants.-J. D.

ART. VIII. Short Communications.

MAMMIFEROUS ANIMALS.-Fox at Deptford.-Sir, I scarcely know whether you will think it worth noticing among your Short Communications, that a fox should have established an "at home" within four miles of London Bridge. My garden is one that is rather remarkable for having its own way. Some years ago, I took a great deal of pains to introduce into it all kinds of wild flowers, shrubs, and trees, and these have grown uninterruptedly and formed large masses of underwood, which, being principally composed of bramble and dog-rose, have established a seat of empire not easily to be shaken. What is termed, vulgarly, a tide-ditch, elegantly, a canal, which the river Thames fills at high water, surrounds more than two thirds of the garden. In this spot a fox established his abode, and made himself very happy for more than six weeks. The neighbours lost their fowls, ducks, pigeons, and rabbits. Many a long face have I seen pulled about their losses; many a complaint of the "howdaciousness" of the rats, the cats, the thieves, and the new police; in all which I

person

took very great and sympathising interest. In the mean time, I used to sit in my summer-house of an evening, and watch master Reynard come out of his retreat; and a great amusement it was to me. He would come slowly trotting along, to a round gravelled place, where four paths met; then he would raise himself on the sitting part, look about, and listen, to ascertain that all was safe, and, being satisfied of this, he would commence washing his face with the soft part of the leg, just above the pad. After this operation was well performed, he used to lie flat down on his belly and walk deliberately along with his fore legs, dragging the rest of his along the gravel, as though it were quite dead, or, at least, deprived of motion; then he would run round and round after his brush; which I could see he sometimes bit pretty severely, and on such occasions he would turn serious all at once, and whisk his brush about in a very angry manner. Poor fellow! a neighbour happened to see him cross the ditch by moonlight into my garden with an old hen in his mouth. The outcry was raised; a search was demanded. Next day there came guns, dogs, pitchforks, and neighbours; the upshot of all which was, that poor Reynard's brush is dangling in my little wainscotted room between an Annibal Caracci and a Batista. — E. N. D. Dec. 14. 1833. [Facts on the fox will be found in II. 457., IV. 11. 24., VI. 207., VII. 181.]

Instances of depraved Appetite in Mammiferous Animals. (V. 714., VI. 364.)— Sir, The case of a dog's eating heath mould, related in p. 714. of Vol. V., is, as you observe, more strange than the case I have, in Vol. III. p. 364., described, of a dog's eating oats, as oats are, as you have observed, of the nature of part of a dog's food; such as, "bran, pollard, barley-meal," &c. : but I think that the dog's eating mould was occasioned by a depraved appetite, similar to that in human creatures who eat coals, mould, &c., of which many cases are on record. lately met with a case of this disease, mentioned in a recent work on the West Indies. The writer states that he saw a slave who was in the habit of eating earth in large quantities. He seemingly considered it a luxury. Yours, J. M. Haughton le Skerne, County of Durham, August 20. 1833.

A somewhat large, and a very interesting, collection of instances of depraved appetite in the human species will be found in Good's Study of Medicine. Humboldt, in his Tableaux de la Nature, informs us that the Otomacs sometimes appease their hunger by distending their stomachs with prodigious quantities of slightly baked clay.

In farther illustration of this subject we present

Some Instances of depraved Appetite in the domestic Rabbit, taken from a communication on the habits of this animal, contributed by our correspondent, Wm. G. Barker. After he has described the usual articles of food with domestic rabbits, he thus proceeds: -

They will drink ale with avidity, but in this matter, I must own, they show much greater sense than pigs, two or three spoonfuls sufficing them. But the appetite of the rabbit appears to have no bounds: vegetables are their natural food; but I unhesitatingly assert that they feed upon animal substances both dead and living. Some few of your readers will undoubtedly feel surprised at this declaration: I have, however, seen it myself. Depravity of appetite is far from being peculiar to the rabbit. If time and space allowed me, I could refer to a kestrel (Falco Tinnúnculus L.), now in my possession; and to some remarkable anecdotes of hyænas, by Professor Buckland, in his valuable Reliquiæ Diluvianæ. Of these in their season. Many, I may say the whole, of your readers have, in all probability, kept rabbits in their younger days, and they must, therefore, be well aware that the male has so great a propensity to devour the young ones, that breeders of rabbits always remove him from the doe, at the time of kindling. As soon, however, as the young ones can see, there remains not the slightest danger to them, from him *; on the contrary, he will sometimes display great ferocity in defending them from their enemies. Far otherwise the doe: if the young are born dead, as they not unfrequently are, they are, in most cases, immediately devoured by the mother; and some have this unnatural propensity in so strong a degree, that the offspring, though born alive, share the same fate. I have known one remarkable and solitary instance of a doe who killed her whole brood, when two months old. They were tolerably fine young rabbits, lively, and appeared healthy, but there was something in them which exasperated their mother, for she seemed wholly bent upon destroying them. It was not done at once, nor in a few hours, but occupied her about ten

* I have known an instance of a male inducing the death of a young rabbit, between a third and half grown. The latter, and all those of the same litter, were moving about on the floor of the apartment, out of their hutch, when the male forced open the door of his own hutch and sprang among them, and bit through the skin of one of them behind the shoulders. In the struggling of the young rabbit to get away, and the detention of it by the male, the skin, in an instant, was torn off a considerable portion of its back, although not wholly detached from the portion of skin left remaining; insomuch that it was judged proper to kill the little rabbit instantly, and this was done.-J. D.