224 [Proc. B. N. F. C, 



Ferns, Lycopods, and Equiseta have come down to us from a 

 period of the world's history when probably flowering plants 

 had not commenced to appear, that first essential of floral 

 existence, bright sunshine, being obscured by a dense and con- 

 stant veil of cloudy moisture floating in an atmosphere of 

 tropical temperature. That period of the pre-Adamite age in 

 which ferns commenced to grow corresponds with the third 

 day's work of the Mosaic account of the creation. After the 

 muds had ceased to flow and the limestone rocks by upheaval 

 appeared above the waters, the warm, moist, carbonic atmo- 

 sphere thrown off by the fresh lime muds produced such a 

 rapid growth of vegetation that the whole land became quickly 

 clothed with ferns and magnificent trees. Amongst the buried 

 forests of the Mountain Limestone 500 varieties of this vegeta- 

 tion, tree-ferns, and species of pines are found hardened to 

 stone. Ferns are there seen in astonishing variety and of 

 very different sizes. Some, resembling the common bracken of 

 the woods, grew into trees of large dimensions, bending with 

 flowing fronds; others remained lowly, like the ferns that 

 flourish in our vales to-day. Gradually these ancient forests 

 sank beneath the floods of sea water, and, settling into the sand 

 and mud of the sea bottom, have been transformed by time, 

 heat, and pressure into the black shining coal seams, which now 

 reveal their history to our curious eyes. Francis estimates the 

 recent ferns of Great Britain at forty-one species, and as the 

 flowering plants of the country do. not fall short of 1,400 

 species, the ferns bear the rather small proportion of 1 to 35 ; 

 whereas of the British Coal Measures flora, in which we do not 

 reckon quite 300 species of plants, about 120 were ferns. Three- 

 sevenths of the entire Carboniferous flora of Great Britain 

 belonged to this familiar class/ and for about 50 species more 

 we can discover no nearer analogues than those which connect 

 them with the fern allies ; and if with the British Coal Measures 

 we include those of the continent of America we shall find the 

 proportion in favour of the ferns still greater. The number of 

 Carboniferous plants hitherto described*amounts to about 500, 

 and of these 250, or one half of the whole, are ferns. 



