VOL. XLII.3 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 731 



these are but rarely found, and may very well be supposed to have been a species 

 of wood of a more solid and durable contexture ; which might consequently 

 withstand any considerable attenuation by water, long enough to permit the 

 chalky particles to penetrate, fix, and convert it into its own substance ; while 

 other woods, less tenacious, insensibly waste, and are carried off by the in- 

 sinuating liquid, together with the chalky particles, which they not only could 

 not arrest, but prevented effectually, by a blending and interposition of their 

 own parts, from adhering to each other. 



The reasons, why he apprehends the process of the whole to have been in 

 the manner described above, are, first, the close vicinity, and almost contact 

 of the chalky hills, on which this bed of malm attends throughout the whole 

 line, and no farther. Secondly, That this malm is an alkalizate body, in a de- 

 gree something inferior to chalk. Thirdly, The reasons for supposing that this 

 valley formerly has been over-run with wood. Fourthly, The disposal of the 

 several detached pieces of malm, which lie in all manner of directions. 

 Fifthly, The resemblance which they bear to roots, trunks, branches, twigs, 

 &c. Sixthly, In the hollow of some of the oblong tubular pieces, which were 

 closed at both ends, on breaking them open, he found the remains of the in- 

 cluded wood attenuated to a mere thread, which, though extremely tender, he 

 could plainly discover to be wood, both by its exterior appearance, and by rub- 

 bing in his hand, to try if it would colour it, as decayed wood, that has imbibed 

 moisture, will do. Within the laminae of several, he found a fair impression 

 of leaves, in no small number, and with little trouble. Some pieces he found 

 quite flat, as if the chalky laminae had involved a chip, and the cavity conse- 

 quently went off insensibly less towards each extremity. Others he found, 

 whose cavities at the extremities were irregularly shaped, agreeable to the 

 jagged ends of broken sticks. Some, in short, he found excavated on one side, 

 and convex on the other, as if the laminae had surrounded a piece of bark. 



As to the microscopical discoveries ; on viewing an infusion of the farina 

 foecundans of the lilium rubrum flore reflexo, in common water, he thought he 

 perceived some alteration in several of these minute bodies, as if the outward 

 shell or husk had, at a small lateral orifice, shed a long train of globules ad- 

 hering to each other, and enveloped in a filmy substance. Immediately he ap- 

 plied some fresh farina, adapted the microscope before-hand, with the tip of a 

 brush dropped a small globule of water on the object, and in a few seconds, he 

 plainly perceived a rope of exceedingly small globules to be ejaculated with some 

 force from within, and contorting itself from one side to the other, throughout 

 the whole line, during the time of action, which does not last above a second 

 or two, and is to be expected from a few only of these farinaceous globules. 



