230 Description of Alabama Coal Plants. 
characteristic of the carboniferous group. Lastly, —— tenuis 
has been found in Coalbrook Dale, Shropshire. 
When we recollect that the Tuscaloosa coal field is sith m 
lat. 33°10’ North, and that so many of the species now first ex- 
amined agree with fossils occurring more than twenty degrees 
farther north in the British Isles, and at a distance of five thou- 
sand miles, with a broad’ ocean intervening, we cannot but be 
struck with this wide diffusion of a Flora, so singularly uniform 
in its character. The phenomena seem to imply at the remote 
period in question the existence, first, of continuous land across 
the space now occupied by the Atlantic, or at least of a chain of 
islands in that region; and secondly, a remarkably equable cli- 
mate ; for Dr. Hooker, author of “the Antarctic Flora,” has late- 
ly observed that no existing Flora, viewed as a whole, preserves 
so uniform a character for so great a distance in a north and south 
direction, as that extending from the south of the island of Chi- 
loe to Cape Hom, a range of twelve or thirteen degrees of lati- 
tude. This wide distribution occurs where the climate in win- 
ter and summer, and throughout the whole year, is peculiarly 
equable. 
Alabama is the most southern spot in the nerthenh hemisphere 
where the ancient carboniferous flora has yet been studied ; geol- 
ogists therefore will rejoice to hear that Prof. Brumby is fully — 
alive to the importance of a more full investigation of the plants 
of that country, of which he will soon, it is — have it im 
his power to form a. ponueiersnie collection. 
Description of Alabama Coal Plants ; by C. T. F. Bunsury, Esq. 
1. Sphenopteris latifolia. Ad. Brongn. Veg. Foss., p. 205, 
t. 57, f. 1—3. (Not of Lindley and. Hutton. ) 
One of these Alabama specimens approaches to S. acutifolia, 
Brongn., which is probably not distinct from S. latifolia. : 
2. Sphenopteris Dubuissoni? Ad. Brongn. Veg. Foss., P- 
195, t..54, f. 4? 
Agrees so nearly with Brongniart’s description and figure that 
I can hardly suppose it to be a different species ; the only distinc- 
tion I perceive, is, that in our plant both the main rachis and that ~ 
gf the primary pinnae is beset with numerous small pean 
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