FLOUA OF TIIK TKIMTV FORMATION. 327 



Texas, hut tho locality seems to coi'ihssimhuI to tlii^ Upper Cross Timl)ers, 

 and the Trinity san'ds occur tlu'ouirli the s;eiieral refjioii described. The 

 description of the wood is wholly fanciful and only reflects the prevalejit 

 belief that the petrified wood l)elongs to the same trees that now grow in 

 the regif)n wh(>re it occurs. Kennedy goes on to say that ])crsonallv he 

 believes the wood to be oidy such living trees incrusted with c.-dcareous 

 [sic] matter in springs antl mineral waters, all of which only emphasizes 

 the undeveloped state of the science of fossil plants and the progress that 

 has been made during the six decades that have elapsed since this was 

 written, at least in this country. 



Only a short time after this an eminent German geologist and 

 paleontologist, Dr. Ferdinand Koemer, came to America and joined the 

 little (Jerman colony that settled at Xew Braunfels, now the county seat 

 of Comal County, Tex. He immediately commenced making geological 

 observations in Texas and published his first paper in 1846." He 

 describes the fossil wood and admits that it is not that of the oak. but 

 thinks that it is dicotyl(Mlonous and not coniferous, although from Cre- 

 taceous strata. In his second paper'' he says: 



When I wrote my I'oriiier pa])er I was not sure al)out tlie I'orniation in wiiicli 

 this fossil wood was originally deposited. I am now pert'ectly convinced that it is 

 derived from Cretaceous strata, having afterwards foimd pieces of it among Creta- 

 ceous fossils at localities where for hundreds of miles around there are none other 

 but Cretaceous strata, and no ti'aces of diluvium or drift are met with. 



In 1849 Roemer published in (ierman a popular work on Texas,' in 

 which he deals with the fossil wood somewhat more fully, both in the 

 text (pp. 229, 230) and in the appendix (pp. 369, 370). He had sent 

 specimens of it to Prof. H. R. Giippei't, in Breslau, who hafl studied its 

 internal structure and foimd some of it dicotyledonous and some conif- 

 erous. The latter he referred to the genus Pinites. A large Cretaceous 

 fauna is described in the appendix. In his map the Cretaceous is shown 

 to occupy a wide belt northwest of a line which is nearly a prolongation 

 in both directions of one drawn through the cities of Austin and San 

 Antonio. 



" .V sketch of ttie geology of Texas, by Dr. Ferdinand Roemer: Am. Journ. Sci.,2d ser., Vol. II, Xovonihcr, 

 1846, pp. 3.">.S-3t5.5. 



''Op. oil., Vol. VI, November, 1848, pp. 21-28. 



<• Texas. Mit Rucksielit auf deutsche Answanderung und die physiselien Verliallnisse des Landes nacli 

 eigener Beobachtung geschildert, von Dr. Ferdinand Koenier. Mit einera naturwischenscliaftlichen .Vnliange. 

 Bonn, 1849, 464 pp. S". Topograpliis<'h-geognostisrlu' Kiirfe. 



