The same nodule which enclosed this lignite contained part of another fossil, the well-marked scales of _Diplacanthus striatus_, an ichthyolite restricted to the Lower Old Red Sandstone exclusively. If there be any value in paleontological evidence, this Cromarty lignite must have been deposited in a sea inhabited by the Coccoeteus and Diplacanthus. It is demonstrable that, while yet in a recent state, a Diplacanthus lay down and died beside it; and the evidence in the case is unequivocally this, that in the oldest portion of the oldest terrestrial flora yet known there occurs the fragment of a tree quite as high in the scale as the stately Norfolk-Island pine or the noble cedar of Lebanon. NO FOSSIL ROSE. Professor Agassiz, in a lecture upon the trees of America, states a remarkable fact in regard to the family of the rose,--which includes among its varieties not only many of the most beautiful flowers, but also the richest fruits, as the apple, pear, peach, plum, apricot, cherry, strawberry, raspberry, &c.,--namely, that _no fossil plants belonging to this family have ever been discovered by geologists_! This M. Agassiz regards as conclusive evidence that the introduction of this family of plants upon the earth was coeval with, or subsequent to, the creation of man, to whose comfort and happiness they seem especially designed by a wise Providence to contribute. CHANGES ON THE EARTH’S SURFACE. In the Imperial Library at Paris is preserved a manuscript work by an Arabian writer, Mohammed Karurini, who flourished in the seventh century of the Hegira, or at the close of the thirteenth century of our era. Herein we find several curious remarks on aerolites and earthquakes, and the successive changes of position which the land and sea have undergone. Of the latter class is the following beautiful passage from the narrative of Khidz, an allegorical personage: