Carbuni/ernus Series.;^ PAL^()NTt)LOGY OP VICTOEIA. IPalaoioic Coal Plants. 



Phi/llotheca, and various Gymuosperms and Ferns of forms inti- 

 mately related to those of the Mesozoic coal beds of the Oolitic 

 formations of Yorkshire and many places on the continent of 

 Europe, and the thick coal deposits of Richmond in Virginia, India, 

 &c., equally distinguished palseontologically from the Palaeozoic 

 coal measures. 



The species here figured is scarcely distinguishable from the Le- 

 pidodendron tetragonum (Sternberg) \= Aspidnria quadrangulata 

 (Presl.)] of the European Palseozoic carboniferous deposits by any 

 definable character, so that my inclination was to indicate it as a 

 var. Auslrale of that species, and I do not see any reason for sup- 

 posing it referrible to the little Devonian Lepidodendron nothaia 

 (linger), nor the probably identical Lepidodendron Gaspianum 

 (Dawson), nor the Lepidodendron Chemungense of Hall, from the 

 Devonian sandstones of New York. Hall's figure of the latter 

 plant is not much less than the narrow part of the right hand 

 branch of our figure, but it shows the scars nearly five times more 

 numerous and scarcely \ of the size ; and all the figures of the 

 Devonian species mentioned, indicate the much smaller, more 

 numerous, and much more acute, lonsfitudinallv elono-ate, leaf-scars 

 as constant characters ; together with a central vascular cicatrix. 



The sandstone containing the present sjjecies in Victoria has 

 been found by Mr. Howitt, over a large extent of Gippsland, to 

 lie always unconformably on the upturned edges of the true Devo- 

 nian rocks. These latter containing Spirifera Icsvicosta, Placoder- 

 matous fish, and various other Devonian fossils. Mr. Carruthers 

 refers a plant from Queensland, which probably is identical with 

 ours, to the Devonian L. not/ium ; but I know of no reason for 

 considering the Gimpie beds Devonian ; the great balance of the 

 palaeontological evidence, in my opinion, indicating rather the Lower 

 Carboniferous age, and as I have said of our Victorian plant I 

 think of the Gimpie one, that the scars are so much larger and 

 fewer on approximately the same sized branches, that it is not 

 desirable to make such a refex-ence. The small vascular scar is 

 sometimes indistinct, and is usually about half way between the 

 upper angle and the middle ; the occasional longitudinal furrow 

 from it is no doubt due, as Mr. Carruthers suggests, to the greater 



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