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More Letters of Charles Darwin — Volume 2 by Charles Darwin
page 29 of 886 (03%)
Dioxide in the Air on the Form and Internal Structure of Plants." The
results obtained were described as differing in a remarkable way from those
previously recorded by Teodoresco ("Rev. Gen. Botanique," II., 1899

It is hoped that Dr. Horace Brown and Mr. Escombe will extend their
experiments to Vascular Cryptogams, and thus obtain evidence bearing more
directly upon the question of an increased amount of CO2 in the atmosphere
of the Coal-period forests.) It is pretty bold. The rapid development as
far as we can judge of all the higher plants within recent geological times
is an abominable mystery. Certainly it would be a great step if we could
believe that the higher plants at first could live only at a high level;
but until it is experimentally [proved] that Cycadeae, ferns, etc., can
withstand much more carbonic acid than the higher plants, the hypothesis
seems to me far too rash. Saporta believes that there was an astonishingly
rapid development of the high plants, as soon [as] flower-frequenting
insects were developed and favoured intercrossing. I should like to see
this whole problem solved. I have fancied that perhaps there was during
long ages a small isolated continent in the S. Hemisphere which served as
the birthplace of the higher plants--but this is a wretchedly poor
conjecture. It is odd that Ball does not allude to the obvious fact that
there must have been alpine plants before the Glacial period, many of which
would have returned to the mountains after the Glacial period, when the
climate again became warm. I always accounted to myself in this manner for
the gentians, etc.

Ball ought also to have considered the alpine insects common to the Arctic
regions. I do not know how it may be with you, but my faith in the glacial
migration is not at all shaken.


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