PROCEEDINGS OF SOCIETJES. 327 



the softer sex. Assistance has been often no less graciously afibrded 

 than thankfully received by most distingushed philosophers ; nor is 

 it presumptuous to hope, that it may in a similar manner, be kindly 

 accorded to us, should we strive earnestly and faithfully to shew 

 ourselves worthy of their protection. Should this eventually prove 

 to be the fact, whilst we are ever ready, as individuals, gratefully 

 to acknowledge the salutary influence which they shed over every 

 condition of life, whether of prosperity or adversity, heightening all 

 our joys, and soothing all our sorrows; as a Society, devoted to the 

 contemplation of whatever is found to be interesting, excellent, or 

 wonderful, throughout the regions of universal nature^ we shall 

 here tender our united homage of respectful admiration to " the 

 fairest and best of all God's works." 



A most interesting communication was made by Mr. Laurance 

 upon some remarkable specimens of fossil fruits and plants, recently 

 found in the coal formation of Lancashire. After a few prelimina- 

 ry observations, Mr. L. proceeded to describe the specimens which 

 be said formed the most interesting illustrations of a delightful 

 branch of the study of those extraordinary changes which the earth, 

 its climate, its inhabitants, and productions have from time to time 

 undergone at remote periods of its history, They tell a tale (he 

 continued) of novel and astonishing import — a tale which, until 

 these latter times, would have challenged universal incredulity — 

 that the earth abounded with fruits — 



" Herb yielding seed, 

 And truit-tree yielding fruit after her kind," 



which man too fondly regards as created solely for his sustenance, 

 a thousand ages ere he became its denizen — a tale told in language 

 so unequivocal that it could not be mistaken. The whole mass of 

 the earth, in fact, or at least that portion of it which comes under 

 our observation, the outer crust of our planet, may be regarded as a 

 vast horlus siccus, of which every stratum is a page. We drain a 

 stagnant lake, and find in its bed, where the water had rested for 

 ages, timber still rooted and undecayed. We excavate the peaty 

 soil of fens, and turn up a venerable Oak, or nuts, or leaves, or 

 acorns, or some other vestige of timber where no wood now adorns 

 the surface of the country. The sea recedes, and exposes beneath 

 its beach a sub-marine forest ; or an extraordinary tide sweeps out 

 an estuary, and from its sandy bed majestic trees thrust out their 

 scathed arm.s, or exhibit their branchless trunks in the attitudes in 

 which they vainly resisted the overwhelming felement. Now we 

 delve into a sandstone quarry, and our operations arc impeded by 

 the interposition of the siliceous stem of some patriarch of the pri- 

 meval woods — a gigantic Pine laid prostrate in the quarry ; or per- 

 haps, enclosed between the sandy laniinii;, wc discover .some delicate 

 specimen of its foliage, the anatomy of its leaves preserved and im- 

 printed upon the unyielding stone with a precision and beauty which 



