. The testimony of the rocks; . OF PLANTS. 63 sent, by being tall and large, a wide front to the tempest,they should also be comparatively solid and strong to resistit; but ^dth this simple mechanical requirement there seemsto have mingled a principle of a more occult character. TheGymnogens or conifers vrere the highest vegetable exist-ences of the period,—its true trees; and aU the tree-likefern allies were strengthened to meet the necessities oftheir increased size, on, if I may so speak, a coniferousprinciple. Tissue resembUng that of their contemporaryconifers imparted the necessary rigid
. The testimony of the rocks; . OF PLANTS. 63 sent, by being tall and large, a wide front to the tempest,they should also be comparatively solid and strong to resistit; but ^dth this simple mechanical requirement there seemsto have mingled a principle of a more occult character. TheGymnogens or conifers vrere the highest vegetable exist-ences of the period,—its true trees; and aU the tree-likefern allies were strengthened to meet the necessities oftheir increased size, on, if I may so speak, a coniferousprinciple. Tissue resembUng that of their contemporaryconifers imparted the necessary rigidity to their frame-work; nay, so strangely were they pervaded throughoutby the coniferous characteristics, that it seems difficult todetermine whether they really most resembled the acro-genous or gynmogenous families. The Lepidodendra,—great plants of the club moss type, that rose from fifty toseventy feet in height,—had well nigh as many points ofresemblance to the coniferae as to the Lycopodites. The Fig. 26. Fig.
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