Iconography of the Mushrooms of Paulet

The history of mushrooms by Bulliard and that of Paulet are the two most remarkable works accompanied by plates that have been published in France. The former has rightly obtained the approval of all botanists who have occupied themselves with mycology: the latter has not been as favored. The works of J. J. Paulet are nonetheless quite significant; when one browses through them, one soon becomes convinced that his vast erudition and tireless zeal allowed him to fulfill, as well as possible, the heavy task he had imposed upon himself.

He published his work in 1793. However, he had already presented the manuscript to the Academy of Sciences and the Royal Society of Medicine in 1775, which had honored it with the most flattering reception and had simultaneously expressed the keen desire to see it promptly released to the public. The text was first printed in two large quarto volumes; the plates then appeared in installments. While the figures sometimes leave something to be desired regarding details, they generally redeem these defects through the accuracy of the drawing and color, which give the mushrooms an appearance of life. With these qualities, the work deserved to take its place in libraries and in the learned world.

The author's hopes were disappointed. For many long years, French and foreign mycologists paid little attention to Paulet's work. We believe this neglect is due to the revolutionary movement that then intensely occupied all minds, to the French nomenclature that was found strange—even though it only served to recall, in a great number of cases, common names used in many of our old provinces—and finally to the publication of the plates, which was not finished until 1835, many years after the death of Paulet. This great labor, which absorbed a large part of the life of a hardworking scholar, might have remained incomplete if M. Houel Paulet, his nephew, had not taken it upon himself to publish the final installments.

The plates that make up this Atlas number 217; they represent the figures of 464 species. All these species do not belong to Paulet; he borrowed a certain number from the authors who preceded him, such as Sterbeeck, Micheli, Batsch, and others. In his work, he provides a more or less extensive description of each of them, which is constantly followed by an indication of the season in which it grows and the place where it is found.