FLORA OF THE AVON-BED. 
Ill 
manner. How were they produced? From seed certainly : but 
whence came the seed ? Before the dredged up mud and stones 
were deposited the quarry was as bare and desolate as crowbar 
and powderblast could make it. The progenitors did not flourish 
on the limestone cliffs around, nor on the breezy downs 400 feet 
above. The adjacent riverbank knew but one or two of them. 
I made repeated enquiries of the men employed in the work, 
whether ballast or dry rubbish of any kind had been handled by 
them, and was always assured that they had been engaged solely 
with material dredged from the bed of the river and from the 
Float. Further, no horse fodder had been brought to the spot: 
steam power and manual labour being alone made use of. Thus 
we are driven to the conclusion without an alternative that the 
seeds of all these plants w'ere contained in the soil at the time of 
its deposition ; that they had been lying embedded in the Avon 
mud, it may be for ages, without losing their vitality ; and that 
notwithstanding their long submersion they had been ready to 
spring into life w'hen at length the favourable opportunity 
offered, and they became exposed to the vivifying action of the 
sun and air. And on consideration of the whole subject of the 
vitality of seeds, I believe this hypothesis will not prove at all 
far-fetched and improbable, as it may at first appear to be. 
It is absolutely certain that seeds, under widely differing 
©ircumstances, may and do preserve their vitality for a long 
period. Although the well-known statement that wheat taken 
from an Egyptian mummy-case germinated on being planted, 
proves not to be well authenticated, there are other instances on 
record quite as remarkable. The fact of raspberry seeds 
growing, which had been taken from the skeleton of a human 
being buried in a tumulus in Dorsetshire, has been doubted ; 
but it was authenticated by Dr. Boyle, who was present when 
the original mass of matter taken from the interior of the body 
was brought to Dr. Bindley in London, and the seeds discovered 
