PEltXS AND MOSSES. 15 
winter peat-fire, that stately trees once grew wliere their 
fuel is now procured ; they speak of the roaring winds and 
furious rains that drove, against the old wood, and how, 
when warm in their beds, young children as they then 
were they trembled to hear the bellowing of the storm, 
and the crashing of the fine old trees that toppled down 
like ninepins one upon the other. The old men new nought 
concerning other peat-bogs, but the circumstance which 
they mentioned explains the occurrence both in this 
country and on the continent of mosses, wherein the trees 
were uniformly broken off, some close to the roots, others 
within two or three feet of the original surface, but all 
lying in the same direction. 
In other instances, peat-bogs have originated from a dif- 
ferent cause the soil became, without doubt, too much, 
exhausted for timber-trees, and, on the principle of that 
natural rotation which occurs in the vegetable world, one set 
of plants died out, and gave place to others. In proof of 
which, it has been ascertained that in the Danish islands, 
and in Jutland and Holstein, fir wood -of various kinds 
(especially Scotch fir), is found at the bottom of peat-mosses, 
although it is certain that, during the last five centuries, no 
cone-producing plants have grown wild in those countries ; 
trees of this family having been introduced towards the close 
of the last century. 
We have mentioned, incidentally, the preserving quality 
of the peat, or Bog-moss ; this quality is attributable to the 
carbonic and gallic acids, which issue from decayed wood, 
and is consequently absorbed by them; as also, to the 
presence of charred wood in the lowest strata of their vast 
accumulations ; for charcoal is a powerful antiseptic, or 
preventive of corruption in animal and vegetable matter; 
and consequently, capable ' of purifying water already 
putrid. 
Nothing is more common than the finding of buried trees 
throughout the vast extent of peat-mosses. In those of Ire- 
