Page:Cyclopaedia, Chambers - Supplement, Volume 2.djvu/86

 M O S

other "great rriifchlef which fruit-trees are liable to in dry ■grounds, which is the falling off of the fruit too early. Mor- timer 1 ^ Husbandry, vol. 2. p 78.

Heath-Moss. Sec the article He ath.

&'#-Mo'SSj in botany, a name given by Count Marfigli to a fpecies of fea Mofs, of a very remarkable finenefs and foftnefs, much more refembling filk than any other of the vegetable productions. It is wholly compofed of a fort of tuft of fine hairs or filaments, and is of a blui/h green colour, and almoft tranfparent. It grows on rocks, {tones, fhells, or any thing elfe that lies in its way, and is found ufually at Snail depths i it is not fo tough and flexible as many other of the fea plants, but is eafily rubbed to powder between the fingers. When examined by the microfcope, the tingle filaments do not ap- pear of the fame equable furface and uniform texture ; but they are feen to be jointed and made up as it were of a great number of pieces fattened end by end to one another, in the manner of the beads of a lady's necklace. It is of a fine bluith green, and perfectly tranfparent before the microfcope, and refembles a firing of gems, fuch as the aqua marina, or fome other like fione. Marfigli Hilt, de la Mer. p. 79.

6Vff-MossEs. Thefe fmall plants are very beautiful when viewed by the naked eye; but when examined with the microfcope, they afford a very pleating variety of ftructure and conforma- tion.

The common kinds afford a great variety of colouring, the different parts of the fame plant often appearing fome brown, fome yellow, fome red, and fome grey. On drying, thefe colours become lefs elegant ; but on putting the dried plant again to foak in water, they arc in fome degree recovered, and the variations are ufually found to be owing to the joints and knots in the italics, which interrupt the courfe of the ge- neral colour, and are often themfelves either black, or of a dark and deep brown.

The fummits of their branches are frequently terminated by little tranfparent bubbles ; thefe fome have taken for fruit, but very erroneoufly ; they are in reality only globules of clear water. Some of them arcjointed at fcveral distances, and every joint has its regular {nape and ftrudture. This is the cafe in the two great claffes of the corallines and the confervas. Others are elegantly variegated with brown, yellow, and green, and though lefs tranfparent, are not lefs beautiful than the former ; thefe are in general of the fucus or fucoides clak. Others are white and tranfparent, like Moffes of cryftai. Thefe are fmall and elegant corallines, and their joints are ufually variegated with black fpots : It is not unuiual alfo to fee, at the extremities of the branches of thefe, certain fmall black globules, which appear to be the fruit ; but they are in reality no other than globules of water thus tinged by fome juices from the plant.

It is poffible, however, that thefe liquid globules may be fo far of the nature of a fruit, as to contain the feed of the plant. We know that the feeds of the fea fucus's in general are en- veloped in a glutinous liquor, and kept at the fummit of the branches of the plant ; they are indeed in thofe large plants furrounded with a vifible and fenfiblfi membrane, which is indeed thicker and longer than any other part of the plant ; and it is not impoffible that thefe fine and fmall globules may have their covering membrane, too fine and thin to become the object of ourfenfes. Marfigli Hift. de la Mer, p. 80. The generical characters of thefe plants are to be feen under their feveral heads of fucus, coralline, and the reft ; but thefe mi- nute plants are often omitted by the writers on botany, though they make fo elegant a figure on being viewed with the affi- fiance of glades.

Moss is alfo a name given by fome to the boggy ground in many parts of England, more ufually called a fen and bog. In many of thefe grounds, as well in England and Ireland as in other parts of the world, there are found vafl numbers of trees ftanding with their flumps erect, and their roots piercing the ground in a natural poflure, as when growing. Many of thofe trees are broken or cut off near the roots, and lie along, -and this ufually in a north- eaft direction. People who have been willing to account for this, have ufually refolved it into the effect of the deluge in the days of Noah ; but this is a very wild conjecture, and is proved falfe by many unanfwerable ar- guments. The waters of this deluge might indeed have warned together a great number of trees, and buried them under loads of earth ; but then they would have lain irregularly and at random ; whereas they all lie lengthway from fouth- weft to north-eat?, and the roots all ftand in their natural per- pendicular poflure, as clofe as the roots of trees in a fo- reft..

Betide, thefe trees are not all in their natural ffatc, but many of them have the evident marks of human workmanfhip upon them, fome being cut down with an ax, fome fplit, and the wedges fttll remaining in them ; fome burnt in different parts, and fome bored through with holes. Thefe things are alfo proved to be of a later date than the deluge, by other matters found among them, fuch as utenfils of antient people, and coins of the Roman emperors.

It appears from the whole, that all the trees which we find in this {affile flate, originally grew in the very places where we now find them, and have only been thrown down and buried

M O S

there, not brought from elfewhere. It may appear indeed an objection to this opinion, that molt of thefe foible trees are of the fir kind ; and that Caefar fays exprefly, that no firs grew in Britain in his time ; but this is eafily anfwered by obferving, that thefe trees, though of the fir kind, yet are not the fpecies ufually called the fir, but pitch-tree ; and Csefar has no where faid that pitch-trees did not grow in England. Norway and Sweden yet abound with thefe trees, and there are at this time whole forefts of them in many parts of Scotland, and a large number of them wild upon a hill at Wareton in Staffordihire to this day.

In Hatfield marfh, where fuch vaft numbers of the foffile trees are now found, there has evidently once been a whole foreft of them growing. The laft of thefe was found alive, and growing in that place within feventy years laft paft, and cue down for fome common ufe.

It is alfo objected by fome to the fyftem of the firs growing where they are found foffile, that thefe countries are all bogs and moors, whereas thefe forts of trees grow only in moun- tainous places : But this is founded on an error, for though in Norway and Sweden, and fome other cold countries, the fir- kinds all grow upon barren and dry rocky mountains, yet in warmer places they are found to thrive as well on wet plains. Such are found plentifully in Pomerania, Livonia, and Cour- land, &c. and in the weft parts of New England there are vaft numbers of fine ftately trees of them in low grounds. The whole truth feems, that thefe trees love a fandy foil ; and fuch is found at the bottoms of all the MoJJh where thefe trees are found foffile. The roots of the fir-kind are always found fixed in thefe, and thofe of oaks, where they are found fof- file in this manner, are ufually found fixed in clay, fo that each kind of tree is always found rooted in the places where they ftand in their proper foil ; and there is no doubt to be made, but that they originally grew there. Whenwe have thus found that all the foffile trees we meet with once grew in the places where they are now buried, it is plain that in thefe places there were once noble forefts, which have been de- flroyed at fome time ; and the queftion only remains how and by whom they were deftroyecl. This we have reafon to believe, by the Roman coins found among them, was done by the people of that empire, and that at the time when they were eftabliihed, or cftabliihing themfelves here. Their own Hittoiians tell us, that when their armies purfued the wild Britons, thefe people always fheltered themfelves in the miry woods, and low watery forefts. Csefar exprefly fays this, and obferves, that Caffibelan and his Britons, after their defeat palled the Thames, and fled into fuch low moraffes and woods, that there was no purfuing them ; and we find that the Silures fecured themfelves in the fame manner when at- tacked by Oftorius and Agricola. The fame thing is recorded ofVenutius, king of the Brigantes, who fled to fecure himfelf into the boggy forefts of the midland part of this kingdom : And Herodian cxprefsly fays, that in the time of the Romans puihing their conquefts in thefe iflands, it was the cuftom of the Britons to fecure themfelves in the thick forefts which grew in their boggy and wet places, and when opportunity offered, to iffue out thence and fall upon the Romans. The confequence of all this, was the deltroying all thefe forefts, the Romans finding themfelves fo plagued with parties of the natives iffuing out upon them at times from thefe forefts, that they gave orders for the cutting down and deltroying all the forefts in Britain which grew on boggy and wet grounds. Thefe orders were punctually executed ; and to this it is ow- ing that at this day we can hardly be brought to believe that fuch forefts ever grew with us as are now found buried. The Roman hiftories all join in telling us, that when Sueto- nius Paulinus conquered Anglefea, he ordered all the woods to be cut down there, in the manner of the Roman generals in England : And Galen tells us, that the Romans, after their Conquefl in Britain, kept their foldiers conftantly em- ployed in cutting down forefts", draining of marines, and pav- ing of bogs. Not only the Roman foldiers were employed in this manner, but all the native Britons made captives in the wars, were obliged to affift in it : And Dion Caffius tells us, that the emperor Severus loft no lefs than fifty thoufand men in a few years time, in cutting down the woods, and draining the bogs of this ifland. It is not to be wondered at, that fuch numbers executed the immenfe deitruflion which we find in thefe buried forefts. One of the greateft fubterranean trea- fufes of wood is that near Hatfield ; and it is eafy to prove that thefe people to whom this havock is thus attributed, were upon the foot where thefe trees now lie buried. The common road of the Romans out of the fouth into the north, was for- merly from Lindum (Lincoln) to Segelochum (Little-Bur- row upon Trent), and from thence to Danum (Doncafter), where they kept a ftanding garrifon of Crifpinian horfe. A little off on the eaft, and north-eaft of their road, between the two laft named towns, lay the borders of the greateft foreft, which fwarmed with wild Britons, who were continually making their (allies out, and their retreats into it again, inter- cepting their provifions, taking and deltroying their carriages, falling their allies and paffengers, and difturbing their garrifons. This at length fo exafperated the Romans, that they were determined to deftroy it ; and to do this fafely and effectual-

8 ly,