Palceozoic Fossil Plants. 216 



in the coal-measures, and a very small number, fifteen species 

 only, of monocotyledons. If several of these last are true 

 palms, an opinion to which Messrs Lindley, linger, Corda, 

 and other botanists of note strongly incline, the question, 

 whether any of the most highly organized plants occur in the 

 primary or palaeozoic strata, must at once be answered in^he 

 affirmative. If you wish to know how far the determination 

 of these palms may be doubtful, I refer you to Adolphe 

 Brongniart's discussion on the affinities of Musseites, Palma- 

 cites, Musocarpum, Trigonocarpum, and others in his re- 

 cently published Essay on the genera of Fossil Plants.* 



When we learn from botanists that there are now 11,000 

 species of living European plants, we must of course regard 

 the 500 species of the coal at present known as a mere frag- 

 ment of an ancient flora. Were we to explore the deltas of 

 the Po and the Rhone as diligently as we have examined the 

 coal-measures, should we obtain the remains of 500 deter- 

 minable species, even now before the obliterating hand of 

 time has effiiced many of the markings by the destroying 

 effect of heat, pressure, the percolation of water, and other 

 causes "? M. Adolphe Brongniart does not seem to suspect 

 that the eocene flora was inferior in variety and richness to 

 that which now decorates the earth, and yet he only describes 

 209 species of eocene plants. 



If we wish to be convinced of the probable extent of our 

 ignorance of the real state of the vegetation of the earth when 

 the coal was formed, it may be well to reflect how seldom 

 the fructification of coniferous trees has been met with in 

 the coal-measures. Mr Bunbury informs me that he never 

 heard of more than one example, — that mentioned in the 

 work of Lindley and Hutton, under the title of Pinus anthra- 

 cina. I never saw any one fossil fir-cone of this age, either 

 in the rocks or the museums of North America or Europe. 

 Yet every collector is familiar with specimens of coniferous 

 wood of the carboniferous period, displaying characters most 

 nearly allied to the living Araucaria. Goppert indeed con- 

 vinced himself that many of the seams of coal examined by 



* Tableau dcs V6g6t. Foss., Diet. Univ. d'Histoire Naturelle. Paris, 1849. 



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