o the hands of some little grandnephews who
will cut it into squares to make paper caps. It is the universal rule.
What our illusions have most fondly cherished comes to a pitiful end
under the claws of ruthless reality.

CHAPTER XVIII. INSECTS AND MUSHROOMS

It were out of place to recall my long relations with the bolete and
the agaric if the insect did not here enter into a question of grave
interest. Several mushrooms are edible, some even enjoy a great
reputation; others are formidable poisons. Short of botanical studies
that are not within everybody's reach, how are we to distinguish the
harmless from the venomous? There is a widespread belief which says that
any mushroom which insects, or, more frequently, their larvae, their
grubs, accept can be accepted without fear; any mushroom which they
refuse must be refused. What is wholesome food for them cannot fail to
be the same for us; what is poisonous to them is bound to be equally
baneful to ourselves. This is how people argue, with apparent logic, but
without reflecting upon the very different capabilities of stomachs in
the matter of diet. After all, may there not be some justification for
the belief? That is what I purpose examining.

The insect, especially in the larval stage, is the principal devourer of
the mushroom. We must distinguish between two groups of consumers. The
first really eat, that is to say, they break their food into little
bits, chew it and reduce it to a mouthful which is swallowed just as it
is; the second drink, after first turning their food into a broth, like
the bluebottles. The first are the less numerous. Confining myself to
the results of my observations in the neighborhood, I count, all told,
in the group of chewers, four beetles and a moth caterpillar. To
these may be added the mollusk, as represented by a slug, or, more
specifically, an arion, of medium size, brown and adorned with a red
edge to his mantle. A modest corporation, when all is said, but active
and enterprising, especially the moth.

At the head of the mushroom loving beetles, I will place a Staphylinid
(Oxyporus rufus, LIN.), prettily garbed in red, blue and black. Together
with his larva, which walks with the aid of a crutch at its back,
he haunts the fungus of the poplar (Pholiota aegerita, FRIES). He
specializes in an exclusive diet. I often come across him, both in
spring and autumn, and never any elsewhere than on this mushroom. For
that matter, he ha