1883.] Anomalous Oolitic and Palceozoic forms of Vegetation. 231 



Potbosites during the Carboniferous age. It has followed the genus 

 Palmacites, now proved to be a Fern, and no other known trace of any 

 Angiosj)erm remains associated with the Palaeozoic rocks. 



I have already referred briefly to one more difficulty that interferes 

 with all attemjits to demonstrate in detail the evolution of the vegetable 

 Ivingdom : I allude to the numerous objects that have been named 

 and classified as Algae : Of the Algoid character of some, possibly of 

 many, of these forms there can be no doubt, but unfortunately the un- 

 questionable examples are the more recent ones, which have little or 

 no bearing upon the Darwinian problem. That some form of marine 

 vegetation must have existed prior to the advent of the Phytophagous 

 molluscs and other animals whose remains abound in the Cambrian 

 rocks, is too obvious to require further proof than that which is supplied 

 by the existence of such animals. Hence when we find in these Palaeozoic 

 rocks objects that look like Fucoids, there is an a priori probability in 

 favour oif their being so. But the detailed construction of a demon- 

 stration like that just referred to demands more than this. In assign- 

 ing to each object its actual place in the ontological history we must 

 have a fair approximation to certainty as to the organisation and 

 Taxonomic position of such objects. But this is exactly what we fail 

 to obtain in the case of these so-called Palaeozoic Fucoids. Dr. 

 Nathorst has recently advanced strong evidence supporting his con- 

 clusion that many of these objects are merely inorganic casts of the 

 tracks of various animals that have crawled over the plastic sea-bed. 

 On the other hand, many have already been identified as imperfectly 

 preserved branches of plants of comparatively high organisation. 

 Hence w^e must regard with extreme caution, all attempts to press 

 these dubious fragments into the service of evolution. But the temp- 

 tation for the evolutionist to do so is a strong one, since the doctrine 

 demands the prevalence, during primaeval times, of such lower forms 

 of plant life. 



At present we have one fact of the needed kind which seems to be 

 correctly interpreted, viz. that a true Fungus of a low order existed 

 during the middle period of the Carboniferous age. The Perono- 

 sporites aniiquhis, from the lower coal-measures of Halifax, seems to 

 be an indisputable Fungus. 



The general conclusions at which our present knowledge justifies 

 our arrival seem to be these: — The Palaeozoic rocks have hitherto 

 furnished no traces of plants of a higher organisation than that of the 

 Gymnosperms, and even these latter are not of the most developed 

 types ; the vast mass of the coaeval vegetation is Cryptogamic. 

 The advent of true Phanerogams is at present only proved to have 

 taken place during the Oolitic period. So far, these general pheno- 

 mena are such as the evolutionist would demand. But, receding into 

 the remoter past, we obtain no further information. These Gymno- 

 sperms existed not only during the Carboniferous period, but were as 

 highly organised during the Devonian age as when the coal-beds were 

 accumulated. Here we again stop. We may ask, what were the 



