The Lore of the Forest [antikvár]

FOREST FOLKLORE, MYTHOLOGY, AND ROMANCE CHAPTER I t FORESTS OF ELD | Archsean Forests ; Primeval and Tropical Forests ; Cosmogonic and ^ Traditional Forests. K I The earliest vegetation of our globe must have been of the p. simplest possible type, as during the Archaean Age the earth still retained much of its original internal heat, and the resulting close, warm and damp climate, with the super-abundant quantity of carbonic acid gas in the atmosphere, would be favourable to the growth and development of Fungi, Moulds, Algae, Mosses and similar plants. Judging from the analogy of after ages, when gigantic plants appeared during the Carboniferous Era, and enormous reptiles had their being throughout Jurassic times, probably these now lowly plant forms attained dimensions far exceeding those of our loftiest forest trees of the present day. If one can imagine the forests of that period, there would probably have been seen enormous toadstools with their domed summits extending over many yards ; patches of gigantic mosses pushing up their vast spore urns into the murky sky ; or mighty masses of cellular moulds ramifying in every direction and producing thickets of globular spore cases borne on long cellular stalks. Absolute silence would reign in the Cimmerian gloom ; no song of bird would be heard, no chirp of insect, nor rustle of leaf, for none of these yet had being. Even during the tempests which must often have raged through these forests, no crash of falling