No. 2S88. TERTIARY FOSSIL PLANTS FROM VENEZUELA— BERRY. 575 



species, confined to the American Tropics in the Antillean, Central 

 American, and northern South American regions. 



The genus Protium, with which the fossil also shows resemblances, 

 has only about four-fifths of its 50 existing species in the American 

 Tropics, the others being scattered in India, Java, Madagascar, and 

 Mauritius. The family Burseraceae comprises 10 oriental, 4 occi- 

 dental, and 2 genera common to both hemispheres. Of the 300 or 

 more existing species over two-thirds are oriental. So far as I 

 know the only previously described fossil member of the family is 

 Burserites Jayettensis Berry 2i of the Fayette sandstone (upper 

 Eocene) in Louisiana and Texas. 



The present species is unfortunately represented by the single 

 folded specimen figured, which comes from the yellowish sandy 

 micaceous clays along the trail, 2\ miles northwest of La Salvadora. 



Family TRIGONIACEAE. 



Genus TRIGONIA Aublet. 



TRIGONAI VARIANS Engelhardt. 



Plate 107, fig. 8. 



Trigonia varians Engelhardt, Abh. Senck. Naturf. Gesell., vol. 19, p. 35, pi. 7, 

 figs. 4-6; pi. 9, fig. 9, 1895.— ?Berry, Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus., vol. 55, p. 290, 

 1919. 



This species was described by Engelhardt from several different 

 sized specimens collected from tuffs near Santa Ana in the Magdalena 

 Valley, Colombia. Rather poor material from the lower Miocene 

 of northern Peru was tentatively identified as this species by the 

 writer in 1919. This last record remains of doubtful value, but in 

 the Bowen collection from Venezuela there are seven specimens from 

 the two principal plant localities that are unquestionably identical 

 with Engelhardt's type material from Colombia. The species may be 

 more fully described as follows: 



Leaves of variable size, ovate to obovate in general outline. Apex 

 and base about equally pointed. Margins entire, slightly undulate. 

 Texture subcoriaceous. Length ranging from 6 cm. to 13 cm. 

 Maximum width, at or slightly above the middle, ranging from 

 3 cm. to 5.25 cm. A maximum sized specimen from Betijoque is 

 figured on the accompanying plate. Petiole stout, its length un- 

 known. Midrib stout, prominent on the undersurface of the leaf, 

 usually curved. Secondaries stout, prominent on the under sur- 

 face; 9 to 12 opposite to alternate pairs diverge from the midrib 

 at fairly regular intervals and at angles of 55 degrees or less, ascend- 

 ing subparallely, becoming camptodrome in the marginal region. 



s < Berry, E. W-, U. S. Geo!. Surv. Prof. Paper (in press). 



