470 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



The vegetation, however, particularly in the Upper Cretaceous, 

 begins to assume a more modern aspect and we find along with the 

 ancient types of ferns (Cladophlebis, Thyrsopteris) , broad-leaved coni- 

 fers (Nageiopsis), and juniper-like evergreens (Moriconia), numerous 

 leaves of oaks, willows, figs, magnolias, sassafras and laurel. The 

 earliest known palms are found at this time. The Cretaceous clays 

 which skirt Raritan Bay in New Jersey abound with these layers of 

 leaves, as do also the Dakota sandstones of the middle west. The 

 magnificent specimen of sequoia with the large cone and the needle- 

 like curved leaves shown in Fig. 2 is from the clays near Cliffwood, 

 N. J., where the twigs are among the most abundant fossils, looking 

 like elegant lithographs against the background of dove-colored clay. 

 This species had cones almost exactly like those of the living Cali- 

 fornian tree and the foliage was also very similar. It was a very wide 

 ranging form, and is considered to have been the source (in part at 

 least) of the amber which is so common in the coastal plain Cretaceous 

 at certain points. 



Fig. 3 shows a flat-leaved form and attached cone of a species more 

 like the modern redwood, in fact it was probably one of its ancestors, 

 which first appeared during the Cretaceous and which became widely 

 distributed, and continued through the Miocene. During the three to 

 five million years of Cretaceous time the sequoias flourished and 

 became widespread. They saw many changes going on all about them. 

 Beneath their shade new races were springing up; the plants of a 

 modern type which were to replace all others in the struggle for exist- 

 ence had obtained their start; animals gamboled about their trunks or 

 climbed in their branches* that were destined to replace the unintel- 

 ligent and clumsy reptiles, and by and by to give rise to the horses, 

 dogs and cats of a later day, and finally to produce that animal which 

 was to attain universal distribution, and to be the destructor of count- 

 less other species — man. 



Remains of sequoias from the lower beds of the Cretaceous have 

 been found in western Europe, in Spitzbergen, in Texas and in the 

 eastern United States. In slightly more recent deposits we find them 

 in Greenland, Canada, in the Black Hills and in Montana. By the 

 middle of the Cretaceous we find over a dozen different species spread 

 over the United States, with still others in Greenland and in central 

 and western Europe. Their remains are often extremely common, 

 whole branches bearing numerous cones, and innumerable twigs, often 

 beautifully preserved, being common fossils. The warm humid climate 

 of the period seems to have been very favorable for their development, 

 and the elevation of the land, by which natural bridges, such as those 



* The Cretaceous mammals are all small, about the size of squirrels, and 

 were probably arboreal forest dwellers. 



