148 Transactions of the Society. 



discovered another striking case of an apparent Fern-frond bearing 

 the reproductive organs characteristic of Phanerogamic plants. 



If we now sum up the results of our rapid survey, we find that 

 among the Carboniferous plants commonly described as Ferns, a 

 certain number, but, as appears probable, only a minority, were 

 really of that nature, as shown by. their Filicinean fructification. 

 Among these true Ferns the Marattiacese were largely represented ; 

 other families also existed, though probably not identical with any 

 of the groups now living. 



The investigations of the last few years indicate, however, that 

 of the Fern-like plants of that period, a large number, prob- 

 ably the majority, were not, properly speaking, Ferns at all, but 

 seed-bearing plants, most nearly allied to such recent Gymno- 

 sperms as the Cycads, while at the same time retaining some of 

 the characters of their cryptogamic allies. 



It is probable that a certain number of the fossils hitherto 

 interpreted as the fructifications of Ferns, will turn out to be the 

 pollen-bearing organs of the fern-like seed-plants, or Pterido- 

 spermese, as we now call them. This is a part of the subject on 

 which much light may be expected to be thrown by further inves- 

 tigation, but which is as yet hardly ripe for discussion. 



In conclusion, a little more may be said about the family 

 Cycadaceae, which in the recent Flora most nearly represents the 

 fern-like seed-plants which played so important a part in 

 Palaeozoic times. They are by no means numerous at the present 

 day, including only nine genera with about seventy species, scattered 

 over the tropical and sub -tropical zones of both the Old and New 

 worlds. During the intervening Mesozoic period, however, the 

 Cycads and their allies held a dominant position, forming a large 

 part of the vegetation of the globe in all latitudes. 



The fern-like habit of some of the recent Cycads has been 

 already referred to ; it may be added that in many of them either 

 the leaf or its pinnee are circinately coiled in the bud, as in Ferns. 



Some of the Cycads, as in the genera Cycas and Encephalartos, 

 attain the dimensions of small trees, reaching about 20 feet in 

 height. The large pinnate leaves (bi-pinnate in the Australian 

 genus Bowcnia) bear a superficial resemblance to those of Palms. 



Cycas, the type genus, differs from the rest of the family in the 

 structure of the leaflets, each of which is traversed by a midrib 

 only, while in the other genera the venation is more complex and 

 fern-like. Cycas is, moreover, of special interest from the character 

 of the female inflorescence. No female cone is produced, but a 

 rosette of leaf-like carpels appears on the main stem in place of the 

 ordinary leaves, and after flowering, the normal vegetative growth 

 of the axis is resumed. The carpels, which bear from two to six 

 ovules each, are lobed and foliaceous in the commonly cultivated 

 species C. revoluta, while in C. circinalis and others they are more 



