I9I4.] SOUTHEASTERN NORTH AMERICA. 101 



confined to the East Indies, two genera with 20 species confined to 

 Polynesia and 6 genera with 35 species ranging from Malaysia or 

 the East Indies to Australia. It is quite obvious from these few 

 facts regarding the existing distribution that the family is an ancient 

 one and that there has been an extensive evolution of both generic 

 and specific types in relatively modern times in the American tropics 

 on the one hand and in the Malaysian region on the other. 



The fossil record while much less complete than might be wished 

 includes at least 13 genera of which six are extinct, and about 160 

 species, by far the largest number being referred to the still existing 

 genus Sapindus which appears well dififerentiated and widely distrib- 

 uted at the dawn of the Upper Cretaceous. There are about ten 

 Upper Cretaceous species of which all but four occur inpre-Senonian 

 strata. Thus there are two in the Perucer beds of Moravia and 

 Bohemia, one at Niederschcena in Saxony — all Cenomanian. Two 

 in the Atane and one in the Patoot beds of West Greenland. Two in 

 the Dakota group; two in the Tuscaloosa formation of Alabama, 

 one in the Middendorf beds of South Carolina, one in the Woodbine 

 formation of Texas ; two each in the Raritan and Magothy forma- 

 tions of the Middle Atlantic states, one in the Montana group and 

 two in the Laramie. I have given this Upper Cretaceous distribu- 

 tion in some detail because of the special interest attached to the 

 deployment of the Upper Cretaceous Dicotyledon^e. It should be 

 noted that seven of these Upper Cretaceous forms are North Amer- 

 ican. There are over thirty Eocene species of Sapindus of which 

 two thirds are North American. The genus is very abundantly rep- 

 resented in both individuals and species in the coastal floras of the 

 Wilcox group from which I have described no less than 9 species. 

 There are four species in the overlying Claiborne group. Species 

 of Sapindus are equally common in the Rocky Mountain province in 

 the Denver, Fort Union and Green River beds. There is an Eocene 

 species in Greenland and one each in New Zealand, Australia, Tasma- 

 nia and Chili. There are four undescribed species in the Ypresian of 

 England and a fifth in beds of the same age in Hungary. There is 

 an Upper Eocene species in France and a second in Oregon. 



There are six or more Oligocene species well distributed in Eu- 



