THE PAGE OF NATURE. 47 



the stems of coniferous trees. The seed-vessel is sessile 

 among the leaves, and bursts in the centre, the lid flying 

 off when the seed is ripe with considerable force, so as 

 to give a distinctly audible report on a still summer day. 

 It is extensively distributed in temperate regions, being 

 almost unknown in the tropics, where the peat is formed 

 by the decomposition of shrubby plants like the common 

 heather. The peat of Tierra del Fuego, the Falkland 

 Islands, and the Galapagos Archipelago, is composed of 

 this bog-moss. We may be able to form some idea of 

 the vast importance of this moss, when we consider that 

 peat-bogs occupy a tenth part of the whole of Ireland, 

 and furnish in the Highlands of Scotland the largest 

 proportion of the fuel consumed by the inhabitants. It 

 is a singular fact that we owe our coals to the carbonized 

 remains of ferns and their allies; and our peats to the 

 decomposed tissues of mosses two of the most useful 

 and indispensable materials in our social economy to 

 two of the humblest families in the vegetable kingdom. 

 How true it is, that things which we are apt to despise 

 or overlook on account of their minuteness and apparent 

 insignificance, are not only full of lessons of beauty and 

 wisdom, but are also made the means, in the hands of a 

 kind Providence, of the greatest good to His creatures ! 

 The plants whose peculiarities have been described in 

 the preceding pages are called urn mosses, their fructifi- 

 cation being urn-shaped, furnished with teeth, and closed 

 with a lid. There is another large class, called scale 

 mosses or liverworts (Hepaticce or Jungermannice), so 

 closely allied to the true mosses that they are frequently 

 confounded even by an educated eye. Of these there 



