This blue stain was formerly, and is even now, deemed sufficient with many mycophagists to place this mushroom on the black-list, but is believed by Mr. Palmer and Mr. McIlvaine to be unwarranted as a stigma, assuming that fresh specimens are employed. The _B. subtomentosus_ is also among the eleven edible Boleti in the list of Dr. Curtis, given on a previous page, and the present author has habitually eaten the species with enjoyment and without unpleasant results. Fresh young specimens with the least change of color would perhaps be the wiser choice for the novice.
[Illustration: _Boletus subtomentosus Boletus chrysenteron_]
=Pileus:= Diameter three to six inches. Color, varying in different individuals, yellowish brown, olive, or subdued tan color; epidermis soft and dry, with a fine pubescence. Cracks in surface become yellow.
=Flesh:= Creamy white in mature specimens, changing to blue, and at length leaden on fracture.
=Tube surface:= Yellow or yellowish green, becoming bluish when bruised; opening of tubes large and angled.
=Stem:= Stout; yellowish; minutely roughened with scurfy dots, or faintly striped with brown.
=Pileus:= Diameter two to four inches; convex, becoming more flattened; soft to the touch, varying from light yellowish brown to bright brick red; more or less fissured with red cracks and clincks.
=Flesh:= Rich, bright yellow, red immediately beneath the cuticle.
=Tube surface:= Olive-yellow, becoming bluish where bruised; tube openings rather large, angled, and unequal in size.
=Stem:= Generally stout and straight; yellowish, and more or less streaked or spotted with the color of the cap.
[Illustration: BOLETUS SUBTOMENTOSUS. B. CHRYSENTERON].
Another species having this peculiar property of "turning blue" even in a more marked degree, and named, in consequence, the _B. cyanescens_, though always heretofore considered poisonous, is now pronounced by certain prominent mycophagists to be not only harmless but esculent. It is still advisable, however, to caution moderation in its use as food, if only on the ground of idiosyncrasy. The spores of this species are _white_, which, with the more minute tube openings, form a sufficient discrimination from _subtomentosus_. The spores should be obtained by a deposit on black or dark-colored paper. The flesh is white also. Other blue-stain species, such as _B. alveolatus_ (Plate 24), are still considered with suspicion, presumably groundless.