l] THE INTERNAL STRUCTURE OF FOSSIL PLANTS. 7 



always hold an honourable and prominent position in the list 

 of the pioneers of scientific palaeobotany ; his work on the 

 Tertiary and Mesozoic floras of France being specially note- 

 worthy among the able investigations which we owe to his 

 ability and enthusiasm \ In Baron Ettingshausen*^ we have 

 another representative of those students of ancient vegetation 

 who have done so much towards establishing the science of 

 fossil plants on a philosophical basis. 



As in other fields of Natural Science, so also in a marked 

 degree in fossil botany, a new stimulus was given to scientific 

 inquiry by the application of the microscope to palaeobotanical 

 investigation. In 1828 Sprengel published a work entitled 

 Commentatio de Psarolithis, ligni fossilis genere ^ ; in which he 

 dealt in some detail with the well-known silicified fern -stems 

 of Palaeozoic age, from Saxony, basing his descriptions on the 

 characteristics of anatomical structure revealed by microscopic 

 examination. 



In 1833 Henry Witham of Lartington brought out a 

 work on The Internal Structure of Fossil Vegetables^ ; this 

 book, following the much smaller and less important work 

 by Sprengel, at once established palaeobotany on a firmer 

 scientific basis, and formed the starting point for those 

 more accurate methods of research, which have yielded such 

 astonishing results in the hands of modern workers. \In 

 the introduction Witham writes, "My principal object in 

 presenting this work to the public, is to impress upon geo- 

 logists the advantage of attending more particularly to the 

 intimate organization of fossil plants ; and should I succeed in 

 directing their efforts towards the elucidation of this obscure 

 subject, I shall feel a degree of satisfaction which will amply 

 repay my labour ^" 



On another page he writes as follows, — "From investi- 1 

 gations made by the most active and experienced botanical | 

 geologists, we find reason to conclude that the first appearance ; 



I 



1 Saporta (72) (73). 



2 Ettingshausen (79). Also numerous papers on fossil plants from Austria 

 and other countries. 



3 Sprengel (28). -» Witham (88). » ibid., p. 8. 



