BERRY: FOSSIL FRUITS FROM THE ANDES OF COLOMBIA 65 
sions of the stone are 1.75-2.25 cm. in length and 1.2-1.5 cm. in 
greatest diameter, which is in the equatorial region. The 
present species is of unknown age and comes from Cipacén, or 
Zipacén in the Province of Cundinamarca, which locality is 
commemorated in the specific name. 
Since this paper was submitted for publication I have received 
a considerable collection of silicified fruits from the upper Eocene 
(Lobitos formation) of Peru. Among these are the abundant 
remains of a Saccoglottis, scarcely, if at all,distinguishable from 
the present species, which leads me to think that the latter 
may be as old as late Eocene or early Oligocene. 
I know of no plant family except the Humiriaceae which has 
the features shown by these fruits, that is, thin flesh, woody 
stone with radially symmetrically arranged seeds. The family 
is a small one, consisting of but three or four genera and about 
a score of existing species. The nearest living relative of the 
fossil in the upper basin of the Amazon I am unable to state, 
being hampered in this respect by the lack of comparative 
material. This scarcity is well illustrated by the number of 
years that elapsed before the botanists at Kew could determine 
the fruits of Saccoglottis amazonica, which are so abundant in 
the Antillean sea drift. 
The modern Humiriaceae are usually segregated into the 
three genera Humiria, Vantanea and Saccoglottis, and all of 
the species are dwellers in the wet forests of Brazil, the Guianas, 
Venezuela and eastern Peru, except the single west African species 
Saccogloitis or Humiria gabonensis Urban, which is sometimes 
considered the type of a fourth genus—Awbrya. The genus 
Saccoglottis has about ten existing species in the region mentioned 
above, and Saccoglottis amazonica, whose curious fruits are such 
a feature of the sea drift in the Antilles, and has even reached 
southwestern England, is an inhabitant of the estuarine forests 
of the great rivers of Brazil, the Guianas, and Venezuela, and a 
few individuals have been found growing in southern Trinidad. 
The tree has never been recorded from Colombia, Central 
America, or the Pacific coast, but I collected characteristic 
fruits in the sea drift of Panama Bay, and I subsequently came 
across a record from the Pacific coast of Costa Rica. e 
presence of a fossil species in central Colombia, of a second fossil 
species in Bolivia and the finding of Saccoglottis amazonica on 
