On Brongniart’s Theory of primeval Vegetation. 873 
ArT. XII. Remarks on M. Adolphe Brongniart’s Opinion as to the 
Vegetation which covered the Surface of the Earth at the different 
Epochs of the Formation of its Crust. By Nat. Joun WincuH, 
Esq. A.L.S. &c. 
Sir, 
In the sixth volume of the Edinburgh Philosophical Jour- 
nal, p. 349. &e. &e., is a translation of M. Adolphe Bron- 
gniart’s essay on the nature of the vegetation which covered 
the surface of the earth at the different epochs of the formation 
of its crust. ‘This paper is well worthy the attention of the 
botanist and geologist ; and sorry should I be if the following 
remark (for it amounts to no more e), which in some measure 
differs from the preconceived opinion of a valued acquaint- 
ance, should be thought hostile to his general theory of the 
ancient state of the globe. But, under the sanction of his 
name, it is now laid down as a law of nature, not to be dis- 
puted, that no phanogamous vegetable existed during the 
period of the oldest of his epochs, no remains of such plant 
having been discovered in the first of his four formations, 
comprising the numerous strata of grauwacke, encrinal lime- 
stone, and carboniferous rocks, magnesian limestone, and red 
sandstone. His systematic division of the vegetable kingdoms 
which at remote periods have from time to time covered the 
surface of the earth appears to me excellent ; but I can by no 
means agree with him in the belief, that, in the first of his 
periods just mentioned, no phaznogamous vegetables were in 
existence ; for it is a fact well known in this neighbourhood, 
and at least thirty years have elapsed since the remark was 
first made, that the ‘large trunks of trees found mineralised in 
our sandstone strata were branched in the same way as our 
forest timber, and must of course belong to the dicotyledonous 
subdivision of plants. As a proof of this, it is only necessary 
to remark that their branches have been thrown out from 
knots which enter the heart of the tree, as is the case with 
trees of a similar description at the present day. ‘This mode 
of growth, if I mistake not, never occurs in vascular crypto- 
gamic vegetables, however gigantic may be their size, though 
it obtains in the tribe pe among which the cotyledons are 
variously formed. On a future occasion I may trouble you 
with a few memoranda respecting the vegetable ‘fossils embed- 
ded in the lias shale of Yorkshire. 
I am, Sir, &c. 
Nat. Jno. WINCH. 
Newcastle upon Tyne, Dec. 10. 1829. 
