PLANTS IN THE COAL FORMATION. 345 



The roof is covered as with a canopy of gorgeous tapestry- 

 enriched with festoons of most graceful fohage, flung in 

 wild, irregular profusion over every portion of its surface. 

 The effect is heightened by the contrast of the coal-black 

 colour of these vegetables, with the light ground-work of 

 the rock to which they are attached. The spectator feels 

 himself transported, as if by enchantment, into the forests of 

 another world ; he beholds Trees, of forms and characters 

 now unknown upon the surface of the earth, presented to 

 his senses almost in the beauty and vigour of their primeval 

 life ; their scaly stems, and bending branches, with their de- 

 licate apparatus of foliage, are all spread forth before him ; 

 little impaired by the lapse of countless Ages, and bearing 

 faithful records of extinct systems of vegetation, which be- 

 gan and terminated in times of which these relics are the 

 infallible Historians. 



Such are the grand natural Herbaria wherein these most 

 ancient remains of the vegetable kingdom are preserved, in 

 a state of integrity, little short of their living perfection, 

 under conditions of our Planet which exist no more. 



SECTION II. 



VEGETABLES IN STRATA ON THE TRANSITION SERIES.* 



The remains of plants of the Transition period are most 

 abundant in that newest portion of the deposites of this era. 

 which constitutes the Coal Formation, and afford decisive 

 evidence as to the condition of the vegetable kingdom at 

 this early epoch in the history of Organic Life. 



The Nature of our Evidence will be best illustrated, by 

 selecting a few examples of the many genera of fossil plants 



* See PI. 1. Figs. 1, to 13. 



