106 
also in the Fern discovered in the old red sandstone in Ire- 
land, Adiantites Hihernicus, the lower pinnae have their 
highest ends covered with clusters of fruit. Such a simi- 
larity is there between the fruit found on living Ferns and 
the Ferns discovered embedded in coal or stone. 
Another great distinguishing feature of the Fern tribe is 
their circinate vegetation, the curling-in of their buds. In 
almost every shady hedge-bank and wood, nay, on our old 
neglected castle walls and bridges, we behold some vegetable 
ammonite or shepherd’s crook in the Ferns as they begin 
to bud. What we see so commonly in the spring months 
clothed in a garment of green, as delineated in the woodcut 
b, page 5, is also to be seen in a sable garment in some of 
our coal fields. In the museum in Jermyn street, London, 
there is a grand specimen with the delicate coil of pinnae, 
every leaflet in its place, from the Le Botwood coal field. 
Let us, then, when we light our fire of a winter day, be on 
the look out and see whether we can discover the rolled-in 
bud of some Fern that grew in the British Isles in olden 
times. 
There is one more distinctive mark by which these pecu- 
liar fossil plants may be discovered. If any should feel 
disposed to visit the other end of Somersetshire and inspect 
the coal mines on the Mendip hills, he may chance to fall 
in with some cylindrical blocks as black as jet. Not a single 
branch or leaf will be found remaining. A mis-shapen ugly 
stump. 
‘‘ Monstrum, korrendum, informe, ingens.” — Yirg. 
A horrid, hideous, great monster. 
These stumps or blocks have many eyes, not taken out as 
that of the Cyclops of old, who lost the only eye he pos- 
sessed. It so happens that they are marked with scars 
of considerable size. Such appearances are owing to the 
manner in which the fronds were broken off. Of this we 
have a picture in miniature in the creeping root-stock of the 
Polypody, as noticed in page 19. These great stems or 
trunks are called Caulopteris, Fern stem. They are short, 
round, or compressed. The scars are oblong, and much 
wider than the spaces between them. These are considered 
to have been part of the trunk of the Tree Ferns, and most 
probably some of the large fronds belonged to these trunks, 
