[SIR J. w. DAW.ON] ON THE GENUS LEPIDOPllLOIOS 73 



rounded murks of the insertion of the organs of reproduction, indicating 

 that they were different from those of Lepidophloios and LepidoiJendron. 

 It is to be observed, however, that when one has the opportunity to sec 

 stems and branches of SigillariiB of difterent ages, the superficial mark- 

 ings present very diverse appearances in different portions of the same 

 tree, and that in the younger branches and the basal portions, the jieculiar 

 ribbed appearance to a great extent disappears, and though a great 

 number of species have been described, it seems certain tluit many of 

 them may be founded on different portions of one and the same tree. In 

 my paper on the Coal Flora already referred to, and in Acadian Geology, 

 I have given several examples of this. 



It is also to be observed that the fruit-scars seen on the stems of 

 Sigillari» could not have given attachment to large cones like those of 

 Lepidophloios and Ulodendron, but only to comparatively slender organs, 

 homologous with leaves rather than with branches, and this acconls with 

 the appearance of the slender and long-stalked organs attributed by 

 Goldenberg and Zeiller to Sigillaria, and variously interpreted as pro- 

 <iucing macrospores or pollen sacs. It seems very probable that there 

 are various arrangements of reproductive organs in different types of 

 Sigillaria} 



In addition, however, to the typical Sigillaria' above referred to, 

 there are others included in the group Clathrariaof pala^obotanists which 

 are destitute of ribs and have the leaf-bases arranged spirally, and more of 

 the type of Lepidophloios, in which group, as already stated, I had placed 

 them in my paper of 1865, and though I am not now disposed to insist 

 on this, at the same time I am convinced that they present essential 

 generic differences from true Sigillaria?. 



As concerns the present subject, I may content myself with pointing 

 out the marked structural difference between the true Sigillaria^ and 

 such plants of the Lepidopthloios type, and also the fact, which I have 



' One of these is shown by a specimen from Sidney, Cape Breton, now in my 

 collection, and figured on a reduced scale in my paper of 1865 in the Journal of the 

 Geological Society and in Acadian Geology, p. 432. It is a good impression of part of 

 a stem or branch of a Favularia near to F. elegans, Brongt. At one side is a short, 

 but distinct branch, slightly ascending, and about two inches long, with an obtuse 

 termination. Near the end it h.is ovoid leaf-scars, differing in form from those on 

 the main stem, and resembling those of Clathraria, but near the base this branch 

 shows clusters of round scars, apparently fruit scars. Another branch at the same 

 level, but at right angles to the first, springs from the main stem, and passes 

 through the slab, being flattened on the opposite side, where it shows similar mark- 

 ings. There would thus seem to have been at least four verticillate branches pro- 

 ceeding from the stem at one level and l)earing the fruit, not on cones, but on their 

 side.s. This is evidently a special modification of the ordinary mode of rings of fruit 

 scars on the main stem. Whether it imports a specific or generic difference I do not 

 presume to decide. I hope that this and other instructive specimens in our collec- 

 tions will eventually be properly figured, since though they do not show the actual 

 fruit, they illustrate its character and mode of attachment. 



