44 SCIENCE PROGRESS. 



preservation of many of the extinct plants has become 

 more generally known and appreciated. If we turn to the 

 numerous memoirs by Prof. Williamson, " On the Organi- 

 sation of the Fossil Plants of the Coal- Measures," which 

 have appeared in the Philosophical Transactions from 1871 

 to the present time, we find there a wonderful wealth of 

 material which has steadily increased, and from the in- 

 vestigation of which many of the lacunae in the necessarily 

 imperfect records of palaeozoic botany have been gradually 

 filled in. 



Already the stage has been reached at which it is 

 possible to gather up the descriptions of isolated speci- 

 mens, and to obtain from them a surprisingly complete 

 picture of several types of extinct plants. Unfortunately 

 it is too much to expect that we can ever be in possession 

 of the complete life-histories of these extinct forms ; it is 

 almost hopeless to look for information as to the earliest 

 stages of development of such ancestral types. Still we 

 venture to think it is not too much to expect, that the 

 almost perfect state of preservation in which palaeozoic 

 plants are occasionally found may yield something more 

 than negative results even in questions of development. 



In the contributions to this journal dealing with fossil 

 botany, it will be the object of the writer to attempt a 

 periodic survey of some of the more important and most 

 recent contributions to palaeobotanical knowledge which 

 may prove useful to botanists and geologists. 



Those publications which are spoken of in the present 

 notice have appeared during the year 1893, and for the 

 most part during the latter half of the year ; but it has been 

 thought better, in this first article, not to confine our re- 

 trospect within the strict limits of the last six months of 

 1893, but to draw attention to such recent works as have 

 materially contributed to the progress of the science. At 

 the end of each article there will be appended a list of 

 most of those contributions to fossil botany which have 

 appeared during the interval between each review of 

 recent literature. Geological succession, rather than 

 botanical affinity or authorship, will, as far as possible, 



