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



where the archaic types of the flora as well as the fauna give a pecu- 

 liar appearance to the scenery. It seems also curious that these 

 older floras are apparently unable to fight against alien plants 

 from more highly-developed countries. Reference was then 

 made to an interesting diagram on the wall, showing the 

 relative abundance of types during geological time, so far as 

 known. Palaeozoic floras are characterised bv cryptogams, 

 giant in size, but structurally the same as our little club mosses. 

 Mezozoic botany is also typically composed of conifers and 

 cycads, and at length we come to the modern tvpes of mono 

 and dicotyledonous plants. The Rev. C. H. Waddell then 

 pointed out the difficulty of determining the lower plants at all, 

 several supposed algae having proved to be of animal origin. 

 Owing to the inability of animals to produce chlorophyll (the 

 means by which minerals are turned into living matter), plants 

 must have preceded animals, and Sir William Dawson and 

 others believe that the beds of plumbago in the archaean rocks 

 of Canada are due to deposits of plants. Characteristic coal 

 plants are lepidodendron, sigillaria, with its roots, known as 

 stigmaria, formerly thought to have been a separate plant, and 

 calamites, allied to our horsetails. Coming to more modern 

 deposits, the leaf beds of Ballypallady are interesting relics of a 

 past flora, including plants that are now tropical, American, or 

 Japanese. S. Gardiner, in a paper read before the Club, says 

 that the flora is mainly coniferous, a cypress, a pine, and a 

 cryptomeria being plentiful. Willow, oak, beech, magnolia, 

 &c, also occur. A very interesting point in fossil botany is the 

 vicissitudes of climate undergone by any one country, as for 

 instance in Greenland there are tropical plants to be found 

 fossil. It is usually hard to find out what changes have gone 

 on in any one family of plants, but one example is the fact that 

 the common flax is a totally distinct plant from any known 

 wild variety, while at the time of the lake dwellings in 

 Switzerland a much smaller and poorer wild flax was the only 

 available one. 



A short discussion followed this paper. 



