TROPICAL FRUITS IN SHEPPEY. 519 
climate than that which Europe presented after 
the commencement of the Tertiary Epoch ; in 
the same manner as tropical seeds and logs of 
mahogany are now drifted from the Gidf of 
Mexico to the Coasts of Norway and Ireland. 
Besides the fruits of Palms, the Isle of Sheppey 
presents an assemblage of many hundred species 
of other fruits,* most of them apparently tropical ; 
these could scarcely have been accumulated, as 
they are, without a single leaf of the tree on 
which they grew, and have been associated with 
drifted timber bored by Teredines, by any other 
means than a sea current. 
We have no decisive information as to the 
number of species of these fossil fruits ; they 
have been estimated at from six to seven hun- 
dred.l In the same clay with them are found 
* According to M. Ad. Brongniart, many of these have near 
relation to the aromatic fruits of the Amomum (cardomom), they 
are triangular, much compressed, and umbilicated at the summit, 
which presents a small circular areola, apparently the cicatrix of 
an adherent calyx ; within are three valves. A slight furrow 
passes along the middle of each plain surface, similar to that on 
the fruit of many scitamineous plants. These Sheppey fruits, 
however, cannot be identified with any known Genus of that 
Family, but approach so nearly to it, that Ad. Brongniart gives 
them the name of Amomocarpum. 
f See Parkinson's Organic Remains, Vol.i. PI. 6, 7. .Jacob's 
Flora Favershamensis. And Dr. Parsons, in Phil. Trans. Lond. 
1757, Vol. 50, page 396, PL XV. XVI. An immense collection 
of these fruits is preserved in the British Museum, another in the 
Museum at Canterbury, and a third in that of Mr. Bowerbank, 
in London. 
