40 Where did Life Begin? 



ished in the earlier and warmer climates of 

 the North, growing to the proportions of 

 forest trees, say from fifty to seventy-five feet. 

 Can it be true that the remains of these plants 

 found in the coal-beds of the Arctics and both 

 continents are telling us that the whole North- 

 ern hemisphere was at one and the same time 

 blessed with a uniform climate exactly suited 

 to them ? Are they not rather testify itig that 

 the Arctic climate was at one time suitable 

 for them, the climate of the Northern temper- 

 ate at another time, and at a later period still 

 the climate of the torrid zone, in the warmer 

 parts of which their stunted forms still linger 

 on the stage ? The simple fact that the car- 

 boniferous formation through these living rem- 

 nants is still in sight in the tropics, and is 

 buried under mountains of ice and snow in the 

 Arctics, is to my mind evidence of many things, 

 and proof positive of two : first, that unless 

 this formation is ending where it began, which 

 seems almost the acme of absurdity, then it 

 began where it first ended, as things usually 

 do, and that locality is, beyond dispute, in the 

 Arctics ; second, that as these coal-plants are 



