CLAYS OF BOVET TEACEY, DEVONSHIEE. 
1029 
every museum in the world might readily be supplied with thousands of specimens of 
this plant from this band. It is represented by branches, twigs covered with leaves, 
fruits (sometimes, but more frequently not, attached to the twigs), and seeds. A few 
dicotyledonous leaves occur here also. 
Though most abundant in this bed, the Sequoia occurs also in the 7th, 40th, and 63rd 
— that is, the highest and lowest beds which have yielded fossils. The Bovey deposit 
evidently represents but one flora. 
The 46th bed yielded a very large number of small seed-vessels {Car'politlies nitens, 
Heee), which, like those described by Dr. Hookee, in 1856, under the name oi Folliculites 
minutulus, but which Professor Heee has identified as Carpolithes Wehsteri^ Be., are 
“ thickly strewed over the surfaces of the laminae of lignite, and slightly imbedded in 
them as if the latter had been soft when the deposit was formed. They lie in all 
directions, but always on their flat surfaces”*. They are by no means confined to this 
bed, though more abundant in it than elsewhere. 
Nothing resembling the cone of Firms sylvestris, described by Dr. Hookee, was found 
during our exploration. But for its complete “ carbonization and bituminization,” I 
should believe that it belonged to a neighbouring bog, mentioned by several writers, 
“ from which have been taken, several feet below the surface, many trees of the fir kind ; 
several 18 inches in diameter, together with pine-nuts, but no coal”f. 
In some of the lower beds, close-fitting joints not unfrequently occur in the lignite, 
the surfaces of which (rarely planes) have a high polish : the w'orkmen call such pieces 
“ glassy and the term aptly expresses the character. They also call them “ slides,” 
belie\ing them to be “ Slickensides.” There do not appear to be any “faults” in the 
beds at the pit. 
It has already been stated that the lignite often has a “ charred” appearance ; and 
indeed it is somewhat difficult to believe that it has not ignited spontaneously ; nor are 
we without facts which give some support to this opinion. It is well ascertained that 
the combustion so prevalent in the heaps of refuse is spontaneous, and the lignite beds 
are sometimes found to be on fire in the tunnels or “ ends.” Mr. Divett, writing me 
on this question, says, “ Some ten or twelve years since, I found a fire raging in an ‘ end’ 
at the western extremity of the pit, which had been abandoned for some months. I 
enclosed the main western ‘ end ’ Avith a dam of timber and clay, in the hope of extin- 
guishing the fire, but only succeeded in checking it. This part of the pit was buried by 
a run of clay from the north for many years, and was excavated again about twelve 
months since, when the fire was still burning. It is now again buried by ‘ run ’ sand. 
I have never doubted that this ignition Avas spontaneous.” Mr. Hatchett, however, Avho 
gave much attention to the chemistry of the lignite, was of opinion that there was no 
evidence of true combustion J. 
* Quart. .Journ. Geol. Soc. vol. xi. p. 566. 
t Mr. ScAMMJEiiii, in Parkinson’s ‘ Organic Eemains,’ vol. i. Letter 12, p. 129. 
X Trans. Linn. Soc. vol. iv. p. 141, &c. ; also Philosophical Transactions for 1804, Part I. p. 396, &c. 
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