3^5 
Hungary ; and in several parts of Wirtemberg, Franconia, Lower 
Saxony, &c. But from the very few specimens of this kind of 
wood, which we obtain from the continent, and, indeed, from their 
being so little dwelt on by the French and German writers on fossils, 
it seems that they exist more plentifully in this island, than else- 
where. The specimens which are in most repute, for their beauty 
and preservation, are those which are found in Dorsetshire, in the 
neighbourhood of Charmouth ; in Somersetshire, particularly in the 
neighbourhood of Bath ; handsome specimens have also been found 
in Derbyshire, Dorsetshire, Oxfordshire, and in many other counties 
of England. 
The appearance of the wood, in this species of fossil wood, as 
well as in the silicious, shows that the wood, which has been thus 
petrified, existed previously, either in a dry and shivered, or in a 
bituminous state. A specimen, from Oxfordshire, is figured in 
Plate VI. Fig. 16. It is of a pale ash colour ; and the light and 
fragile woody fibres may yet be seen very plainly, although much 
broken, intersected, and separated by the crystallizations of the cal- 
careous spar, which has pervaded every part. The substance of this 
fossil is rather tender ; yielding sometimes, even to the force of the 
fingers. Its gravity is of course considerably less than that of sili- 
cious wood. Although the greater part, by far, of its bulk is formed 
by the spathose matter, yet the form of the wood is tolerably well 
preserved ; the natural direction of the fibres of the wood seeming 
to have directed, for the most part, the crystallizations into striae, 
converging towards the centre of the wood, as may be observed in its 
section, shown at Fig. 2, of the same Plate. Distinct masses of 
crystallizations and veins of spar may frequently be observed to 
penetrate its substance in various parts. 
A specimen of the Charmouth fossil wood is represented in Plate 
III. Fig. 9. The colour of this kind of fossil wood is darker than 
the former, it being of a deep brown colour. It is harder than that 
