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210
The Fairy-Land of Science
·
Arabella B. Buckley
158
The
next
question
is,
what
kind
of
plants
were
these?
Have
we
anything
like
them
living
in
the
world
now?
You
might
perhaps
think
that
it
would
be
impossible
to
decide
this
question
from
mere
petrified
pieces
of
plants.
But
many
men
have
spent
their
whole
lives
in
deciphering
all
the
fragments
that
could
be
found,
and
though
the
section
given
in
Fig.
49
may
look
to
you
quite
incomprehensible,
yet
a
botanist
can
reed
it
as
we
read
a
book.
For
example,
at
S
and
L,
where
stems
are
cut
across,
he
can
learn
exactly
how
they
were
build
up
inside,
and
compare
them
with
the
stems
of
living
plants,
while
the
fruits
cc
and
the
little
round
spores
lying
near
them,
tell
him
their
history
as
well
as
if
he
had
gathered
them
from
the
tree.
In
this
way
we
have
learnt
to
know
very
fairly
what
the
plants
of
the
coal
were
like,
and
you
will
be
surprised
when
I
tell
you
that
the
huge
trees
of
the
coal-forests,
of
which
we
sometimes
find
trunks
in
the
coal-mines
from
ten
to
fifty
feet
long,
are
only
represented
on
the
earth
now
by
small
insignificant
plants,
scarcely
ever
more
than
two
feet,
and
often
not
many
inches
high.
Have
you
ever
seen
the
little
club
moss
or
Lycopodium
which
grows
all
over
England,
but
chiefly
in
the
north,
on
heaths
and
mountains?
At
the
end
of
each
of
its
branches
it
bears
a
cone
made
of
scaly
leaves;
and
fixed
to
the
inside
of
each
of
these
leaves
is
a
case
called
a
sporangium,
full
of
little
spores
or
moss-seeds,
as
we
may
call
them,
though
they
are
not
exactly
like
true
seeds.
In
one
of
these
club-mosses
called
Selaginella,
the
cases
near
the
bottom
of
the
cone
contain
large
spores,
while
those
near
the
top
contain
a
powdery
dust.
These
spores
are
full
of
resin,
and
they
are
collected
on
the
Continent
for
making
artificial
lightning
in
the
theatres,
because
they
flare
when
lighted.
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