IT MAY SOUND ILLOGICAL, then, for me to defend the
soup manufacturers for using the term 'mush- room' when they mean other varieties of edible fungi; I see that Major Stewart in our cor- respondence columns calls this 'coarsely indis- criminate.' Perhaps it is, but there happens to be no English term to describe the other varieties. Individually they are apt to be known, if they are known at all, by scarifying names like 'lurid boletus'; collectively they are known only as 'toadstools,' a pejorative term—as, indeed, is 'fungus.' If Major Stewart (or some other inter- ested party) would invent a descriptive name for edible fungi which would attract rather than repel the housewife in the market, he would be doing the community a service; but in the mean- time it is surely reasonable that they should be allowed to shelter under 'mushroom'?
Previous page
