PREFACE: 
Tue present Volume may be considered as the second contribution 
which M. Figuier has made towards his Tableau de la Nature. 
The World before-the Deluge” contemplates a period in the 
earth’s history when its natural ornament was absent; when its 
surface was an arid desert—a vast solitude—the abode of silence 
and death. Plants preceded animals in the order of creation; 
when the great animals which preceded man were created by the 
wisdom of the Eternal, the earth was already clothed in a mantle 
of vegetation. We learn from Holy Scripture that ‘‘God said, Let 
the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit- 
tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the 
earth: and it was so. And the earth brought forth grass, and 
herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, 
whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was 
good.” (Genesis i. 11, 12.) 
Yes, it was good; for plants are at once the ornaments of the 
earth and the means of existence to the beings which occupy it; 
and this natural ornament the infinite goodness of the Creator has 
diversified in a wonderful manner, so that no part of the globe can 
be said to be deprived of it; and, as a natural consequence, plants 
have been the theme of great writers in all ages. Homer has sung 
their praise ; Hesiod, Theocritus, Lucretius, Virgil, Horace, Ovid, 
and Claudius, among the Latins, have described them; and poets 
of all countries have been inspired by them. Infancy loves flowers, 
