35 



the cohesion of this internal layer is overcome, the heavy column falls suddenly 

 in a perpendicular or oblique direction from the roof of the gaUery whence coal 

 has been extracted, wounding or killing the workmen who stand below. It is 

 strange to reflect how many thousands of these trees fell originally in their native 

 forests, in obedience to the laws of gravity ; and how the few which continued to 

 stand erect, obeying after myriads of ages, the same force, are cast down to 

 immolate their human victims." 



With respect to the fauna of the period, no air-breathing creatures, mth the 

 exception of a few insects, had been discovered until the year 1844. Bones and 

 footprints of reptiles have, however, since that time been met with in several parts 

 of the world. Beds of fresh water shells alternate with marine strata, containing 

 fishes associated with crustaceans and molluscs ; but the most remarkable feature 

 of the period is its flora, composed chiefly of oryptogamic plants of gigantic size, 

 differing specifically from living types ; and it is further remarkable that in the 

 most widely separated parts of the world, where coal has been discovered, such 

 as Australia and America, a striking,' uniformity of genera is found to have pre- 

 vailed. Cycadeae and Conifer*, but no true exogens, and only a few endogenous 

 plants, referred to palms, have yet been met vnih ; huge stems and leaves of 

 ferns, equisetums, or horse-tails, and lycopodiums or club-mosses, are, however, 

 found in great profusion, rivalling in point of size the forest trees of modern times. 

 Specimens of these, such as sigillaria, calamites, lepidodendra, &c., were collected 

 from the Coal shales at Christchurch by our party. A comparison of the flora of 

 the Coal measures with plants of living species, establishes the remarkable fact in 

 natural history that, as we find in the animal, so it is in the vegetable kingdom, 

 many intermediate links in the organic series have been lost. 



It is believed by geologists, and supported by the evidence of botanists and 

 chemists, that this superabundant vegetation was nurtured by a warm and moist 

 atmosphere, charged with an excess of carbonic acid gas. Such a condition of 

 things would have been highly favourable to vegetable, though not to animal life, 

 accounting .satisfactorily for the paucity of air-breathing animals already alluded to 

 as being characteristic of the period. Through the absorption of carbon thus going 

 forward in the vegetable kingdom, the atmosphere was undergoing a chemical 

 process of preparation by which the earth became a fit habitation for that superior 

 class of animals which were afterwards to appear. 



If we regard this vast depository of carbon, with its associated iron-stones, in 

 relation to the social and intellectual advancement of the human race, we cannot 

 fail to recognise the wsdom and goodness of the Creator, and the perfect design 

 everywhere evinced in all His wondrous works. 



Having remained for some time at the Coal pits, our party retraced their steps 

 to Whitchurch, devoting the time to botanical observations, and receiving from 

 Dr. Lingen much valuable information as to the structure and properties of the 

 plants collected. On our re-assemblmg at the inn, a choice selection of Silurian 

 fossils, chiefly trilobites, in excellent preservation, was exhibited by Mr. Richard 

 Johnson, of Hereford. Some fragments of deer's horns, and the bone of an ox, 



