200 THE LATE DR. NEWELL ARBER: CRITICAL STUDIES 
These specimens appear to me to be all decorticated and their specific 
attribution doubtful. n 
Dr. Kidston’s most recent lists (18. p. 132) of synonyms of L. ophiurus 
also contain the above references, which I should omit. There is, further, a 
more doubtful reference to Lindley and Hutton’s Lepidodendron Sternbergi 
(1831, vol. i. pl. 4; 1834, vol. ii. pl. 112), as well as to figures of cones and 
leafy shoots of this species which are not under consideration here. Some of 
the former, as I have said, belong to L. lycopodioides. 
The Case for Lepidodendron simile, Jongmans *. 
In 1909, Jongmans (14. p. 174) published tlie following synonymy, and 
figured examples to which the new term JL. similis (sic) was applied :— 
1833-34. Lepidodendron elegans, Lindl. & Hutt. Foss. Flora, vol. ii. pl. 118. 
1838, Lepidodendron elegans, Brongn., Hist. Végét. Foss. vol. ii. p. 35, pl. 14. 
1878-79. Lepidodendron lycopodioides, Zeiller, Explie. Carte Géol. France, vol. iv. pt. 2, 
p. 111, pl. 171. 
1882. Lepidodendron lycopodioides, Renault, Cours Bot. Foss. vol. ii. p. 14, pl. 5. fig. 8. 
1886-88. Lepidodendron lycopodioides, Zeiller, Flore Poss. Bass. Houill. Valenciennes, 
p. 464, pl. 69. figs. 2-3; pl. 70. fig, 1. 
This synonymy appears to me to represent a confusion between two 
distinct species. 
The Brongniart and Renault figures are, as I have attempted to show here, 
examples of L. ophiurus. 
On the other hand, Lindley and Hutton's plant and all the specimens here 
indicated as figured by Zeiller in 1878-79 and 1886-88 appear to me to be 
undoubtedly L. lycopodioides, Sternb. 
In diseussing this synonymy one is at a disadvantage, for, although some- 
thing like ten years have passed since it was first put forward, and although 
Kidston (15. p. 137 : 18. p. 134) has subsequently repeated it on several 
occasions, no diagnosis of Jongmans’ species has ever been published. We 
have not been told what are the essential characters in which these particular 
2 
plants are all supposed to agree, and how they differ from other related 
species. In fact, in view of the modern laws of nomenclature, it is doubtful 
whether Jongmans’ name has, in the absence of a diagnosis, any scientific 
status whatever. Kidston has merely told us that the foliage of L. Iycopo- 
dioides is distinct from that of the plants which he cites as L. simile, some of 
which, however, are L. lycopodioides pure and simple, according to no less an 
authority than the late Prof. Zeiller. With this view I quite agree, and 
I reject L. simile, Jongmans, as adding confusion to an already involved 
question. 
* This is a MS. name of Kidston’s, but this authority is ignored here since MS. names are 
best discarded. The specific name was first actually published by Jongmans, who thus 
became the author. 
