PLANTS OF COAL STRATA, 
113 
require a high temperature, and yet the 
coal of Melville Island in the Polar re¬ 
gions, contains fragments of these remark¬ 
able fossils. 
III. The Marsiliacice^ altogether peculiar 
to this formation, and also common in it 
to both continents. These small plants 
with their whorls of star-like leaves, look 
like delicate drawings made with varnished 
ink on the surfaces of the coal shale. 
IV. We may also enumerate decided co¬ 
niferous trees in the coal strata, some palms 
and canes, the gigantic Lepidodendron and 
Sigillaria, with other forms elsewhere re¬ 
ferred to. 
It is therefore established that the north¬ 
ern latitudes once displayed st vegetation 
composed of species, the representatives of 
which we now nurse as exotics in hot¬ 
houses; and that too by heat produced 
from the combustion of their remote 
predecessors which grew unsheltered in 
the same spot. So passing strange is the 
system of adaptations and conversion exhib¬ 
ited in creation. 
The following tabular view of the vege- 
K 5 
