. The testimony of the rocks; . ieu-tenant Newbolds researches in the deposit in which theyoccur has since demonstrated, on stratigraphical evidence,that not only does it belong to the great Tertiary division, * Leaf of a tree allied to the chn. HISTORY OF PLANTS. 75 but also to one of the comparatively modern formations ofthe Tertiary. The earlier flora of this Tertiary division presents anaspect widely difierent from that of any of the previousones. The ferns and their allies sink into their existingproportions; nor do the coniferse, previously so abundant,occupy any longer a prominent place
. The testimony of the rocks; . ieu-tenant Newbolds researches in the deposit in which theyoccur has since demonstrated, on stratigraphical evidence,that not only does it belong to the great Tertiary division, * Leaf of a tree allied to the chn. HISTORY OF PLANTS. 75 but also to one of the comparatively modern formations ofthe Tertiary. The earlier flora of this Tertiary division presents anaspect widely difierent from that of any of the previousones. The ferns and their allies sink into their existingproportions; nor do the coniferse, previously so abundant,occupy any longer a prominent place. On the other hand,the dicotyledonous herbs and trees, previously so inconspic-uous in creation, are largely developed. Trees of thoseAmentiferous orders to which the oak, the hazel, the beech,and the plane belong, were perhaps not less abundant in theEocene woods than in those of the present time: they weremingled with trees of the Laurel, the Leguminous, and theAnonaceous or custard apple families, with many others; Fig. PALMACITES LAMANONIS. (A Palm of the Miocene of Aix.) and deep forests, in the latitude of London (in which theintertropical forms must now be protected, as in the CrystalPalace, with coverings of glass, and warmed by artificialheat), abounded in graceful palms. Mr. Bowerbank foundin the London clay of the island of Sheppey alone the fruits 76 THE PALiEONTOLOGICAL of no fewer than thirteen different species of this pictm-esquefamily, which lends so peculiar a feature to the landscapesin which it occurs; and ascertained that the undergrowthbeneath was composed, in large proportion, of creepingplants of the gourd and melon order. From the middle orMiocene flora of the Tertiary division, — of which we seemto possess in Britain only the small but interesting fragmentdetected by his Grace the Duke of Argyll among the trap-beds of Mull, — most of the more exotic forms seem tohave been excluded. The palms, however, still sur^dve inno fewer than thirty-one
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