BY THE REV. J. E. TENISON-WOODS, F.G.S., F.L.S. 155 



Cordaites australis M'Coy (Pal. Vict., Decade 4, p. 22. Plate, 

 36, figs. 6 and 7.) Leaves several inches long, thick, flattened, 

 parallel sided, with unequal, longitudinal, simple parallel striae ; 

 clasping base slightly widened and bent a little downwards. 

 Leaves at one inch from the base, about four to five lines wide ; 

 base about two to three lines wider. 



" The leaves of this species although narrow, are much thicker 

 in the substance than in any of the other known species, and the 

 parallel veins are more unequal and less distinct, the larger having 

 fewer and sub-equal small ridges with much more numerous sub- 

 equal fine striae, thus approaching more to the foliage of Dammara 

 and favoring M. Grand-Eury and Prof. Schimper's idea of coni- 

 ferous atfmites. Common in the Upper Devonian flags of Iguana 

 Creek." 



I believe I have identified the same species in the shales and 

 slates of Gympie, Queensland (Lady Mary shaft), and also in the 

 sandstone ranges at the Drummond Range (Bobuntungun in the 

 sandstone, about one mile west of the railway station.)* In both 

 it is not very abundant. 



Class Conifers. 



Trees or shrubs, mostly with resinous secretions, the leaves are 

 stiff, sometimes linear or needle like, sometimes short and 

 scale like, or more rarely broad, lobed, or divided. The flowers 

 are unisexual, either in cylindrical or short catkins, with 

 closely packed scales, or the females are solitary. There 

 is no perianth. The stamens in the males are either inserted 

 on the axis of the catkin under the scales, or the anther-cells 

 are sessile, on the inside of the scales themselves, which 

 then form part of the stamens. The ovules and seeds are 

 naked, that is without ovary style or pericarp, although sometimes 

 more or less enclosed in two bracts, or in a fleshy or hardened 

 disk. The seeds are albuminous with one, or sometimes several 

 embryos in the centre, each embryo having sometimes more than 



* It is very common in the fragments of stone of which the embankment 

 is made at the Medway bridge, with Lepidodewtoon. 



