32 



PAL^ONTOLOGICAL BOTANY. 



be considered, as it generally is, an animal, the existence of 

 contemporary plants may be inferred, inasmuch as without 

 vegetable life animals could not obtain food. In the Lower 

 Silurian or Grauwacke, near Girvan, Hugh Miller found 

 a species resembling Zostera in form and appearance. In 

 the Lower Old Red Sandstone of Scotland he detected 

 Fucoids, a Lepidodendron, and Lignite with a distinct Coni- 

 ferous structure resembling that of Araucaria,* besides a 

 remarkable pinnate frond. In the middle Old Red of For- 

 farshire, as seen in the Arbroath pavement, he found a 



Fig. 19. 



Fipr. 20. 



Fiir. 21. 



fern with reniform pinnas and a Lepidodendron. In the 

 Upper Old Red, near Dunse, a Calamite and the well-known 

 Irish fern Cyclopteris Hibernica occur. f This fern, Palseo- 



Fig. 19. Polygonal scale, s, of a species of Horse-tail (Equisetum), 

 bearing membranous sacs, t, which open on their inner surface to dis- 

 charge spores. 



Fig. 20. Spore of Equisetum, surrounded by two filaments with 

 club-shaped extremities. The filaments are represented as coiled round 

 the spore. 



Fig. 21. Spore of Equisetum, with the filaments (elaters) ex- 

 panded. 



^ Miller's Footprints of the Creator, 192-199. Doubts have been 

 thrown on the antiquity of this specimen by those who support the 

 erroneous progressive development theory ; but the presence, in the 

 same nodule, of a scale of a fish only found in the lower Old Ked, puts 

 the matter beyond doubt. Dr. M'Nab on the Structure of a Lignite 

 (Pal(Eopitys) from the Old Red Sandstone. (Trans. Bot. Soc. x. p. 312.) 



t Specimens of these fossil plants, as well as numerous others, 

 illustrating the fossil flora of Scotland, are to be seen in Mr. Miller's 

 collection, now in the Edinburgh Museum of Science and Art. 



