211 



HaKDWICKE'S science-gossip. 



Science-Gossip ; these nodules are called by the 

 coal miners of the locality " coal balls," and are 

 found right in the middle of the coal-seam, and are 

 composed of all kinds of vegetable tissues, seeds, 

 spores, sporules, &c, which would have been coal 

 had they not been calcified, and thus prevented from 

 becoming bituminized. 



The above nodule of which I am speaking was 

 full of macrospores ; I have often found detached 

 macrospores in these nodules before, but never in 

 juch a large quantity : I should say it contains some 

 thousands. These nodules are met with in what is 

 called in the locality the " hard bed," because another 

 seam of coal is often worked from the same pit- 

 shaft, but a little below the above seam, called the 

 'soft bed." This soft bed is the one Professor Huxley 

 speaks of, in a recent lecture on coal, as being very 

 highly charged with macrospores. These macrospores 

 when found in the coal are almost invariably flat- 

 tened, and do not appear to show any structure 



x 20 



\IfJ X 200 

 Fig. 145. Microspore. 



Fig. 146. Macrospore. 



when the coal is cut into transparent sections. This 

 is not the case with those found in the nodules 

 above alluded to. The one I am speaking of was 

 surrounded, to the depth of half an inch, with iron 

 pyrites, and in every fragment I break are one or 

 more of these detached macrospores to be seen, 

 their dark outline showing beauti£ully against the 

 bright, sparkling character of the pyrites. Some 

 individual spores show the caudate appendages, as 

 at Pig. 147, but the capitate character of the 

 appendages in the figure are only shown under 

 favourable circumstances. I have seen them in 

 transparent sections cut from these nodules, but 

 under no other condition. When the macrospores 

 are laid bare, so as to show the base, they have a 

 triangular form, as shown at Pig. 147; the sides of 

 the spores seem to be drawn inward on three sides, 

 which gives the whole spore a slight triangular 

 |orm. This triangular base is continued downwards, 

 to form a sort of footstalk, by which the spore is 

 attached to the bract of the fruit on which it rests, 

 as seen at Fig. US, and they are found resting on the 

 bracts, sometimes in double and sometimes in 

 treble rows. Pig. US is a rough sketch of one side 

 of the middle part of this compound fruit, and 

 shows two fruitful bracts at the part where the 

 macrospores leave off, and the microspores begin, 

 one of which is shown at Pig. 115. This fruit be- 

 longed to a species of Lepidodendron, the macro- 

 spores being situated at the lower part, and the 

 microspores at the upper part, in this respect it 

 bears a close analogy to our Selaginella. Brong- 



niart, of Paris, was the first in 186S to draw the 

 attention of the botanical world to this old illustra- 

 tion of recent botany ; his opinion is that the micro- 

 spores produced antherozoids, which became fecun- 

 dating organs, and that the macrospores germinated 

 after being fecundated. Since Brongniart described 

 this fruit, Mr. Einney, of Manchester, has described 

 a very beautiful series of casts of this fruit from 

 the Ironstone shales of Scotland, which show the 

 fruit as they lay in the shale, with the bracts laid' 

 bare, and the microspores in position on the 

 upper part of the fruit, and the macrospores in 

 position at the lower part, with a portion of 

 the fruit-stalk, by which it had been attached 

 to the branch of the tree. I believe that Mr. 

 BiDney has a prior claim over Brongniart to 

 the discovery of this fruit, but he neglected to 

 describe it. I remember very well Mr. Binney 

 showing me the speci- 

 men I have described 

 above, about twelve 

 years ago, but he did 

 not describe it till 

 1S70. Some little 

 idea of the profuse- 

 ness of these spores 

 may be gathered from 

 the fact that one or 



Fig. 147. Macrospore with 

 caudate appendage. 



Fig. 148. Section of fruit 



showing spores enclosed 



in bracts. 



two seams of coal have been almost entirely- 

 made up of them. I have sections of a bit of 

 coal from a Leicestershire coal-seam that are 

 full of them, and I have found them in the 

 under-clay that lies beneath most of our coal- 

 seams. I hope the short description 1 have given 

 of this peculiar fruit will be interesting to the 

 readers of Science-Gossip, and will be one more 

 hint as to the important part the microscope can 

 take in the investigation of various sciences, and 

 not least, in that of Geology. 



I shall have a number of these macrospores to 

 distribute among the readers of Science-Gossip 

 in a short time. 



John Butterwortii. 



Goafs Shaw, Oldham. 



Our readers will be glad to learn, that the Loan 

 Collection of Scientific Instruments will be con- 

 tinued on exhibition for some time, on account of 

 its success. 



