116 Remarlcs on the Ancient Flora of the Earth. 



He sets out by affirming, that no remains of plants have been 

 observed in the old red sandstone (rothliegende.) We would, 

 however, request our author to compare only one of the numer- 

 ous memoirs which treat of this rock formation, to convince 

 himself that this opinion of his is inaccurate. The works of 

 Charpentier, Freisleben, Schlotheim, Hoff, &c., abound in in- 

 formation regarding the local situation of the plants of a for- 

 mer world, met with in the undoubted formation of old red 

 sandstone, or rothliegende. In the classical work of Alex. v. 

 Humboldt, {Essai sur le Gisem. p. 21 4), we find the i-emark, 

 that the whole formation of the red sandstone {gres rotige), is 

 generally characterised by the absence of fossil shells, but that in 

 both hemispheres it abounds in trunks of fossil trees and other 

 debris of the monocotyledones. (V. Rel. Hist. t. x. p. 278.) I 

 myself have had frequent opportunities of admiring the great 

 number of petrified trunks of trees found in the quarries at KyfF- 

 haiiser in Thuringia, in the midst of old red sandstone, some of 

 them three feet thick, and from twenty to thirty feet long. They 

 are exactly the same with those which are not uncommon in the 

 whole extent of the old red sandstone throughout the district of 

 Mansfield, and also in the Thuringerwald ; and occasional exam- 

 ples of them, from their upright position, seem to prove that they 

 grew immediately in the place where they are at present buried. 

 From the previously mentioned works (particularly from those 

 of Freisleben, Kupfersch, vol. iv. p. 172,) it is sufficiently known 

 that a great part of the coal formations in the north of Ger- 

 many, particularly those of Manebach at Ilraenau, of Wetten, 

 of Opperode, Ilfeld, &c., which have become so famous as depo- 

 sitories of vegetable remains, are found as subordinate beds in 

 the midst of old red sandstone, or rothliegende. The truth of 

 this assertion I have had an opportunity of proving in various 

 places. From the uppermost strata of old red sandstone, roth- 

 liegende itself, which some refer to the formation of zechstein, 

 (S. Freisl. 1. c. iii, p. 238,) we have recently received intelligence 

 of the abundant appearance of a plant which is evidently a fresh- 

 water production. (Leonh. Taschenbuch. xxii. I. p. 253.) 



M. Brongniart further maintains, that, hitherto, nothing but 

 marine plants has been found in the formation of magnesian 

 limestone or zechstein ; and this opinion seems probable, when 



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