54 THE MEDALS OF CREATION. Cuar. IV. | 
often unavailing. The pyritified fir-cones of the Wealden 
decompose in like manner: I have had the misfortune to 
lose several unique and most instructive specimens from 
this cause ; boiling them in linseed oil preserves them, but 
greatly impairs their appearance. 
ON THE INVESTIGATION OF THE FOSSIL REMAINS OF 
VEGETABLES. 
VEGETABLE ORGANIZATION.— As fragments of the stems, 
trunks, and branches, are very often the only vestiges of 
fossil plants, a knowledge of the characters by which the 
principal divisions of the vegetable kingdom may be distin- 
guished by their internal structure, is indispensable to the 
successful investigation of the Flora of the ancient world. 
Although I have treated of this subject in the Wonders of 
Geology, (Wond. p. 694,) it will here be necessary to present 
the student with more ample details. The excellent 
introductory botanical works of Dr. Lindley, and Pro- 
fessor Henslow, convey full information on this, and every 
other department of the science, and should be consulted 
by those who intend to make this branch of Geology their 
particular study. For the general reader, and amateur 
collector, the following brief notice of a few obvious essential 
characters of vegetable organization, may perhaps afford 
sufficient information, to enable them to understand the 
principles on which the successful investigation of the nature 
and affinities of fossil plants must be conducted. 
Every plant is essentially an aggregation of cells ;* and 
* « A cell in botanical language, means a little bag composed of 
membrane, and containing a living substance capable of spontaneous 
growth by multiplication, or division of its parts. Of such little 
bodies, millions of which may be contained within the space of a 
cubic inch, all the soft parts of vegetables are composed ; in sea-weeds 
they are often of large size.”—-Dr. Harvey’s Sea-side Book, with which 
the reader is doubtless familiar. 
