The
great majority of botanists adhere to the older view, and see in
the wonderful Tertiary expansion of the flowers a manifold
adaptation to the insect friends and insect foes which then
became very abundant and varied.
Resisting the temptation to glance at the marvellous adaptations
which we find to-day in our plant world-- the insect-eating
plants, the climbers, the parasites, the sensitive plants, the
water-storing plants in dry regions, and so on--we must turn to
the consideration of the insects themselves. We have already
studied the evolution of the insect in general, and seen its
earlier forms. The Tertiary Era not only witnessed a great
deployment of the insects, but was singularly rich in means of
preserving them. The "fly in amber" has ceased to be a puzzle
even to the inexpert. Amber is the resin that exuded from
pine-like trees, especially in the Baltic region, in the Eocene
and Oligocene periods. Insects stuck in the resin, and were
buried under fresh layers of it, and we find them embalmed in it
as we pick up the resin on the shores of the Baltic to-day. The
Tertiary lakes were also important cemeteries of insects. A great
bed at Florissart, in Colorado, is described by one of the
American experts who examined it as "a Tertiary Pompeii.
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