Where did Life Begin? 39 



no hair because their ancestors were hairless 

 and they have needed none. If the hairy 

 elephant and also animals now tropical have 

 by their remains hinted and suggested that 

 the Arctic regions once had not only a warm 

 climate, but actually teemed with tropical life, 

 the remains of vegetal life have positively tes- 

 tified to it. 



'* As the tree falls, so it lies." The recently 

 discovered coal-beds of the Arctics prove that 

 the coal-plants once flourished there in abun- 

 dance, and where the coal-plants flourished 

 there were the warm climatic conditions of 

 the coal-plants also. Moreover, the fossils of 

 these coal-beds; and many of the species of 

 plants of which they were composed, are iden- 

 tical with those of the coal-beds of Europe 

 and America, showing not only a like tem- 

 perature for all, but a kinship and common 

 ancestry. 



These same plants, such as tree ferns and 

 lycopods, dwarfed and stunted by the cold of 

 our present tropics, where only they are now 

 found, and growing to the height of but a few 

 feet, not exceeding a man's stature, once flour- 



