294 FOSSIL FLORA OF THE 



same elements, existing in each only in different proportions ; both 

 are composed of carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, and nitrogen, but the 

 carbon is proportionally much larger, and the gases much smaller, in 

 the coal than in the wood. 



Direct evidence of the vegetable origin of coal has been furnished 

 by Mr. Hutton. He cut thin slices of the different kinds of coal 

 found near Newcastle, and on examining them with the microscope, 

 he found that they exhibited fine reticulations or network of the 

 original vegetable texture, along with other cells, filled with a beautiful 

 wine-coloured resinous matter, which was exceedingly volatile, and 

 which was first driven off by heat. 



Vegetable structure can be seen in some coals, even by the naked 

 eye. Soft pieces, called by miners " mother- coal," not unfrequently 

 show fibrous woody texture. Goppert not only perceived vegetable 

 impressions in the coal of Silesia, but could also distingviish the 

 families of the plants and trees of which it had been formed. In the 

 coal of the mountain limestone of this district, we have found distinct 

 vegetable remains ; in the Lemington coal we have seen Lepidoden- 

 drons, and in that at Alnwick Moor, and at Shilbottle, Stigmaria 

 ficoides with rootlets attached, and spreading through the coal. A. 

 simple experiment will give additional ocular proof ; for if any of our 

 coals be well burnt, and the residue or ashes examined under a micro- 

 scope, tubes and tissue belonging to vegetables will be observed. Ncr 

 is it difficult to account for the presence of these organized fragments ; 

 because silica, or some other incombustible mineral, when in a state 

 of solution, has replaced portions of the original vegetable substance, 

 assumed its structure, and while the carbonaceous elements have been 

 dissipated, these indestructible portions have passed unchanged 

 through the fire. 



The evidence is conclusive : Coal is a transformed vegetable. The 

 mineral fuel which is placed in the depths of the earth, which has a 

 thickness of several hundred feet, which extends over an area of many 

 thousaxid miles, and which ministers largely to domestic comfort, and, 

 by its application to manufactures and locomotion, has vastly increased 

 the productive power of our country, and even given new impulses to 

 the progress of civilization, was, ages ago, an immense assemblage of 

 living plants flourishing on the surface of the earth. Marvellous as 

 is the change, it is paralleled, and even surpassed, by others of a 

 kindred nature, since the diamond, which lends a lustre to female 

 beauty, and is the most valuable and brilliant of gems, is also a 

 transformed vegetable having the same origin, and being formed of 

 the same elements as coal and anthracite. 



The Plants, or the original materials of ivhich Coal was formed. 



The question now comes for consideration, what were the plants of 

 which coal was formed ? and what affinity or analogy do they bear to 

 existing vegetation ? The inquiry is not without interest, since it 

 may lead to new facts in the history of vegetation, and throw light 

 over the conditions of the era when the Carboniferous scries was 



