carries with it the caseum, which is perhaps only an altered albumen.

The produce of the bread-fruit tree can no more be considered as bread
than plantains before the state of maturity, or the tuberous and
amylaceous roots of the cassava, the dioscorea, the Convolvulus
batatas, and the potato. The milk of the cow-tree contains, on the
contrary, a caseous matter, like the milk of mammiferous animals.
Advancing to more general considerations, we may regard, with M.
Gay-Lussac, the caoutchouc as the oily part--the butter of vegetable
milk. We find in the milk of plants caseum and caoutchouc; in the milk
of animals, caseum and butter. The proportions of the two albuminous
and oily principles differ in the various species of animals and of
lactescent plants. In these last they are most frequently mixed with
other substances hurtful as food; but of which the separation might
perhaps be obtained by chemical processes. A vegetable milk becomes
nourishing when it is destitute of acrid and narcotic principles; and
abounds less in caoutchouc than in caseous matter.*

(* The milk of the lactescent agarics has not been separately
analysed; it contains an acrid principle in the Agaricus piperatus,
and in other species it is sweet and harmless. The experiments of MM.
Braconnot, Bouillon-Lagrange, and Vauquelin (Annales de Chimie, volume
46, volume 51, volume 79, volume 80, volume 85, have pointed out a
great quantity of albumen in the substance of the Agaricus deliciosus,
an edible mushroom. It is this albumen contained in their juice which
renders them so hard when boiled. It has been proved that morels
(Morchella esculenta) can be converted into sebaceous and adipocerous
matter, capable of being used in the fabrication of soap. (De
Candolle, sur les Proprietes medicinales des Plantes.) Saccharine
matter has also been found in mushrooms by Gunther. It is in the