RECENT PANDANEjE. 
50 .‘} 
sustaining Creator, in whose Will and Power, 
these harmonious systems originated, and by 
tvhose Universal Providence, they are, and have 
^t all times been, maintained. 
Fossil Pandanece. 
The Pandanese, or Screw-Pines, form a mono- 
t^otyledonous family which now grows only in 
the warmer zones, and chiefly within the influ- 
ence of the sea ; they abound in the Indian 
■Archipelago, and the islands of the Pacific Ocean. 
Their aspect is that of gigantic Pine apple 
plants having arborescent stems. (See PI. 63, 
1 .) 
This family of Plants seems destined, like the 
Cocoa nut Palm, to be among the first vegetable 
Colonists of new lands just emerging from the 
*^cean ; they are found together almost universally 
^y navigators on the rising Coral islands of tro- 
pical seas. We have just been considering the 
ifistory of the fossil stems of Cycadem in the Isle 
Portland, from which we learn that Plants of 
^irat now Extra-european family were natives of 
Britain, during the period of the Oolite formation, 
unique and beautiful fossil fruit represented 
our figures (Plate 63, Figs. 2, 3, 4,) affords 
probable evidence of the existence of another 
Iropical family nearly allied to the Pandanese at 
