HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



165 



i\.nd land, which fiactuates the more 

 In average movement, still does rise ; 

 A fact which need not cause surprise, 



But one for brains to ponder o'er. 



Since, to obey Divine command. 

 The waters gathered in the deep. 

 Perforce they this position keep, 



And interchange not with the land. 



Eut land is washed into the sea, 



And all around us is decay ; 



So,, slowly but without delay, 

 The continents would wasted be. 



For this Dame Nature — don't deride, 

 Her labours otherwise were lost, 

 Had she not counted up the cost ? — 



A "critical" remedy applied, 



And to a belt of sea confined. 



The movements of the upper crust 

 Of earth, and thus entrapped the dust 



Of continents to be defined 



When Pluto wakes from out his sleep. 

 And stirs his furnace fires below, 

 And land begins to grow and grow 



From out the borders of the deep. 



Hail, then, the savants who discerned 



The purposes of Nature, vast ! 



In theory as unsurpassed 

 As any vouchsafed by the learned. 



A. Conifer. 



' How WAS Coal really Formed ? — An im- 

 portant paper on this subject has just been read 

 before the Geological Society, by Mr. E. Wethered, 

 F.G.S., who pointed out that seams of coal do not 

 always occur in one bed, but are divided by distinct 

 partings, some of which, as in the case of the Durham, 

 main seam, contain Stigmarise. It was important to 

 notice this feature for several reasons, but especially 

 as the beds of coal, defined by the partings,- showed 

 differences both in quality and structure. In the case 

 of the shallow seam of Cannock Chase they had at 

 the top a bed of coal i foot 10 inches thick, the brown 

 layers of which were made up of macrospores and 

 microspores. The bright layers were of similar con- 

 struction, except that wood-tissue sometimes appeared, 

 also a brown structureless material, which the author 

 looked upon as bitumen. He thought that hydro- 

 carbonaceous substance would be a preferable term. 

 What this hydrocarbonaceous material originated 

 from, was a question for investigation. In the lower 

 bed of the Welsh "Four Feet" seam wood-tissue 

 undoubtedly contributed to it ; whether spores did 

 was uncertain ; it was true they could be detected in 

 it. In the second bed of the shallow seam they had 

 a very different coal from the upper one. It was 

 made up almost as a whole of hydrocarbonaceous 



material. Very few spores could be detected. Spores 

 resisted decomposing influences more effectually than 

 wood-tissue, which seemed to account for the fact 

 that where they occur they stand out in bold relief 

 against the other material composing the coal. Below 

 the central bed of the shallow seam came the main 

 division. In it was a large accumulation of spores, 

 but hydrocarbon formed a fair proportion of the 

 mass. The conclusions on the evidence elicited were 

 (i) that some coals were practically made up of 

 spores, others were not, these variations often oc- 

 curring in the beds of the same seam ; (2) the so- 

 called bituminous coals were largely made up of 

 hydrocarbon, to which wood-tissue undoubtedly con- 

 tributed. An appendix to the paper, by Professor 

 Harker, of Cirencester, dealt with the determination 

 of the spores seen in Mr. Wethered's microscopic 

 sections. Taking the macrospores, the resemblance 

 to those of Isoetes could not fail to strike the botanist. 

 He had procured some specimens of Isoetes lacustris 

 in fruit, and compared the spores with those from the 

 coal. When gently crushed, the identity of the 

 appearance presented by these forms from the coal 

 was very striking. The triradiate markings of the 

 latter were almost exactly like the flattened three 

 radiating lines which mark the upper hemisphere of 

 the macrospores of Isoetes lacustris. He therefore con- 

 cluded that the forms in the coal were from a group 

 of plants having affinities with the modern genus 

 Isoetes, and from this Isoetoid character he suggests 

 the generic title of Isoetoides pending further investi- j 

 gation. In the discussion which followed, Mr. Car- 

 ruthers could not accept the conclusions arrived at. 

 He remarked that there was no doubt as to the 

 nature of the vegetation which formed the coal. The 

 triradiate structure of the macrospores referred to was 

 merely a superficial marking which threw very little 

 light on the affinities of the spores. These spores 

 had been found connected with leaves of Sigillaria 

 and Lepidodendron. The coal itself had been a soil 

 which supported the vegetation ; it is penetrated by 

 the Stigmarise, roots of Sigillaria and Lepidodendron, 

 and by roots of other plants. Trees grew in the coal 

 itself. Coal-seams are the remains of forests which 

 grew upon swampy ground and were subsequently 

 covered by clay. Spores were first noticed in coal 

 by Professor Morris. They abound in some places, 

 but there is no reason to attribute them to Isoetes or 

 to any other form of submerged vegetation. Pro- 

 fessor W. Boyd Dawkins had never seen sporangia in 

 coal, although macro- and microspores abounded. 

 Coal is composed of two principal elements, carbon 

 proper and a fossil resin, to which the blazing property 

 of coal is due. The latter is mainly due to the spores ; 

 but the blazing element cannot be wholly attributed 

 to them. The carboniferous forests grew upon hori- 

 zontal tracts of alluvium not far above the water-line. 

 Mr. E. T. Newton considered this paper to be the 

 first systematic attempt that had been made to ascer- 



