The L'Anse sentinel., 1923-12-28

ated In system Of thousands of mil
| lions of similar stars.
What can he tell of the place of
life In timer Temporary, the stars
evolved and revolved for aeons before
the earth was born-they will doubt
less continue to fulfill their destiny, to
roll on quite unperturbed long after
the scum has evaporated. and the ter
restrial experiment Is over.
what can he tell of the significance
Of life, IL any, In the march of sidereal
evolution? What of it's meaning?
Nothing"
Prof. Edward c. Jeffrey, authority
on plant morphology, was the second
speaker. A summary of his remarks
on THE Origin of Life on Land fol-
lows: ~
'The biologist seems to be justified
In adopting neither the mechanistic
nor the vitalistic attitude in regard to
the origin of life, since we know moth
ing whatever about the manner In
which living matter made its appear
ance upon our earth. The best in
formed biOchemists frankly admit that
they know nothing regarding the origin
of life"
He then gave a definition of life, or
rather of living matter, and went on:
There are two kinds of living mat
ter, plants and animals. The former
are intimately related in their essen
tial activities to potassium, while the
latter show an equally close relation
to the alkali metal sodium. Plants are
and always have been much more
abundant than animals and have, as a
consequence, eXerted much more
fundamental influence upon our earth
and its atmosphere.
''The definition of life upon land" he
said, depends on organization rather
than activities. Land animals are con-
structed to breathe air by means Of
lungs, while water animals respire wa
ter through their gills. Land plants
are provided with an elaborate mech
anism for absorbing, conducting and
evaporating water, which is entirely
are, however, many cases of land.
plants living in water and fewer of
water plants living on landtO
Similar Animal Contrasts.
"On the animal side there are SINH
lar contrasts between essential organi-
zation and the mode of life. For ex-
ample, whales and porpoises are fun
damentally terrestrial in their struc-
ture, yet they inhabit the sea. On the
other hand, many aquatic animals,
such as the crustacea, are able to car
ry on some sort Of existence on land.
1t is generally conceded that aquatic
forms were the ancestors Of both land
plants and land animals.
"Since it is very generally conceded
that biology Is fundamentally his
torical science. in view of the essential
characteristics of living matter, II fol-
lows that the early forms of plants and
animals are of great Importance. On
the animal side our knowledge is great.
ly restricted, both by the poverty of
material and also by the fact that we
are, as a rule, familiar with the hard
parts or skeleton only, of the earlier
forms. In the case of plants, we are
in much better position, since the
structural features of the earlier land
plants are frequently and sometimes
abundantly preserved in all their
parts.
"The Devonian supplies us with the
earliest trustworthy evidence OF plant
life on land. In that period the higher
types of animals were still, for the
most part, confined to the waters and
had made no important excursion on
the lands. In other words, from the
animal point of view, the Devonian
was the Age of Fishes.
Recent discoveries of Devonian
land plants in both Europe and Ameri-
ca give us for the first time rather
complete picture of the earliest high
life on land. The most primitive De-
vonlan terrestrial plants were leafiess
and rootless and presented a bizarre
and archaic appearance, both as a re-
suit of their primitive organization,
but still more because they lacked the
grace of foliage which lends charms
to the denizens of our modern fields
and forests.
these Devonian plants furnish
strong proof for the doctrine. of evolu-
tion or descent, since they actually
realize the organization. which has
been theoretically predicted for the
earliest land plants"