The lore of the plants which have successively clothed this ancient earth during the thousands of centuries before men appeared is generally ignored or tossed on one side with a contemptuous comment on the dullness and “dryness” of fossil botany.

It is true that all that remains of the once luxuriant vegetation are fragments preserved in stone, fragments which often show little of beauty or value to the untrained eye; but nevertheless these fragments can tell a story of great interest when once we have the clue to their meaning.

The plants which lived when the world was young were not the same as those which live to-day, yet they filled much the same place in the economy of nature, and were as vitally important to the animals then depending on them as are the plants which are now indispensable to man. To-day the life of the modern plants interests many people, and even philosophers have examined the structure of their bodies and have pondered over the great unanswered questions of the cause and the course of their evolution. But all the plants which are now alive are the descendants of those which lived a few years ago, and those again came down through generation after generation from the plants which inhabited the world before the races of men existed. If, therefore, we wish to know and understand the vegetation living to-day we must look into the past histories of the families of plants, and there is no way to do this at once so simple and so direct (in theory) as to examine the remains of the plants which actually lived in that past. Yet when we come to do this practically we encounter many difficulties, which have discouraged all but enthusiasts from attempting the study hitherto, but which in reality need not dismay us.

When Lindley and Hutton, in 1831, began to publish their classical book The Fossil Flora of Great Britain, they could give but isolated fragments of information concerning the fossils they described, and the results of their work threw but little light on the theoretical problems of morphology and classification of living plants. Since then great advance has been made, and now the sum of our knowledge of the subject, though far from complete, is so considerable and has such a far-reaching influence that it is becoming the chief inspiration of several branches of modern botany. Of the many workers who have contributed to this stock of knowledge the foremost, as he was the pioneer in the investigations on modern lines, is Williamson, who was a professor at Manchester University, and whose monographs and specimens are classics to-day. Still living is Dr. Scott, whose greatness is scarcely less, as well as an ever-increasing number of specialists in this country, who are continually making discoveries. Abroad, the chief Continental names are Renault, Bertrand, Count Solms Laubach, Brongniart, Zeiller; and in America is Dr. Wieland; while there are innumerable other workers in the field who have deepened and widened the channels of information. The literature on fossil plants is now vast; so great that to give merely the names of the publications would fill a very large volume.

But, like the records left by the plants themselves, most of this literature is unreadable by any but specialists, and its really vital interest is enclosed in a petrifying medium of technicalities. It is to give their results in a more accessible form that the present volume has been written.

The actual plants that lived and died long ago have left either no trace of their form and character, or but imperfect fragments of some of their parts embedded in hard rock and often hidden deep in the earth. That such difficulties lie in our way should not discourage us from attempting to learn all the fossils can teach. Many an old manuscript which is torn and partly destroyed bears a record, the fragments of which are more interesting and important than a tale told by a complete new book. The very difficulty of the subject of fossil botany is in itself an incentive to study, and the obstacles to be surmounted before a view of the ancient plants can be seen increase the fascination of the journey.

The world of to-day has been nearly explored; but the world, or rather the innumerable world-phases of the past, lie before us practically unknown, bewilderingly enticing in their mystery. These untrodden regions are revealed to us only by the fossils lying scattered through the rocks at our feet, which give us the clues to guide us along an adventurous path.

Fables of flying dragons and wondrous sea monsters have been shown by the students of animal fossils to be no more marvellous than were the actual creatures which once inhabited the globe; and among the plants such wonderful monsters have their parallels in the floras of the past. The trees which are living to-day are very recent in comparison with the ancestors of the families of lowlier plants, and most of the modern forest trees have usurped a position which once belonged to the monster members of such families as the Lycopods and Equisetums, which are now humble and dwindling. An ancient giant of the past is seen in the frontispiece, and the great girth of its stem offers a striking contrast to the feeble trailing branches of its living relatives, the Club-mosses.