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might have been expected to exist in early times. On the 
22nd of April, 1835, one hundred and twenty-one species 
had entirely disappeared ; the fifty-six which remained were 
those which have their prototypes in the coal measures. 
The same experiment accounts for the want of fructification 
in Tossil Ferns, for it showed that one of the consequences of 
long immersion in water is a destruction of the fructification 
of those plants. The fact is, that Ferns have an antiseptic 
property — have a power of resisting the action of water. It 
is said that when M. Dumont D’Urville was shipwrecked, 
his plants sunk under water at the same time. When they 
were afterwards recovered, it was observed that the Grasses 
and Ferns were saved, while the exogenous plants were 
destroyed. Hence it seems most probable with respect to 
the coal formations, that all the plants first fioated in the 
v/ater ; that a certain portion of them, the Ferns, &c., did 
not decompose, and that these were finally embedded in the 
rocks in which they are found. The coal shale with which 
they are surrounded, seems to have been originally mud, 
and thus is confirmatory of this opinion. It cannot there- 
fore be concluded, because many plants now existing are 
not to be found in the coal measures, that therefore none 
such grew in the primeval days. Vegetation may have been 
as luxuriant and vigorous then as at the present day. It 
has been remarked that in Lindley’s experiment, all the 
Horsetails, (Equiseta) were decomposed, though such are 
found in great abundance in a fossilized state. As these 
were the only exceptions, and as they may have been imper- 
fect specimens on which he made the experiment, this is not 
sufficient to shake Lindley’s hypothesis. The old proverb, 
“the exception proves the rule,” may apply in this case as 
in a variety of others. 
Whether the Fossil Ferns are a distinct species from 
those now existing, or whether they are varieties produced 
by altered circumstances, is a question too complicated to 
be discussed in such a work as this. The mignionette is a 
large perennial plant in its own native habitat ; here it is a 
tender annual. When Britain was full of dense forests, 
with swamps in rich productive soil, the Fern Tree may 
have thrived in the inmost jungle, as it does now in New 
Zealand and Van Diemen’s Land. It can hardly be imagined 
