AMBER. FOSSIL PALMS. 183 
species of cedar, cypress, juniper, yew ; and of oak, poplar, 
beech, ash, &c. ; and a few ferns, mosses, liverworts, con- 
fervee, and fungi. The Amber appears to have exuded from 
the bark and wood, but chiefly from the root-stock, as is 
the case with the Copal and Animé, which are resinous 
substances obtained from certain trees in India and America, 
and largely employed for varnish: these resins are often 
substituted for true amber, especially when they contain 
insects, &c. ; but the latter are always of the existing indige- 
nous species of the country. The difference observable in 
the colour of the various species of amber, is attributable to 
accidental chemical admixtures.* 
Fossiz Pats (Palmacites).—Reserving an account of the 
fossil plants belonging to the other grand division of Dicety- 
ledons, the Angiosperms (ante, p. 61), for the last section of 
the present chapter, I proceed to notice the most important 
family of the Hndogens, or Monocotyledons, whose remains 
occur abundantly in many tertiary deposits—the PALms, 
The Palms are, for the most part, lofty trees, having a 
single cylindrical stem, which, like that of the arborescent 
ferns, rises to a great height, and is crowned with a canopy 
of foliage. The trunks are solid, most dense on the outer 
part, and in some species (as the Cane-palms) are coated with 
a thin siliceous epidermis. At a little distance above the 
surface of the ground, strong, simple, rope-like roots are sent 
off from the stem, appearing like clusters of stays or braces 
to support the trunk ; and the base of the petrified palm- 
trees often exhibits vestiges of these organs.t The leaves 
are supported by petioles, and are in most species very 
large ;{ they are either pinnated or flabellated (fan-shaped), 
and sometimes nearly split in half: the veins or nervures 
* Petrifactions, p. 23. 
++ Specimens in the Brit. Mus. Petrifactions, p. 12. 
+ In the Fan-palm (Corypha), the leaf is sometimes twenty feet 
broad. 
