57 



2. When found in the rcx?k they have still their vertical 

 position. They are imbedded (at Shade River, Athens 

 Co., O.,) in a shaly sand-rock coated with a carbonaceous 

 crust. 



3. They are truncated at crown with a crater-like de- 

 pression. The center or axis is constituted of parenchyma- 

 tous cells and vermicular or horseshoe-like fibro-vascular 

 bundles, concentrically arranged. 



4. The stem is a regular system of tubular fascicles 

 varying in size, enlarging toward the periphery and more 

 isolated centrally by parencliyma, the outer ones crowding 

 into any shape. In all of them is a six to eight lobed star 

 as a fibro-vascular center, the remaining mass composed of 

 quadrangular cells, and the envelope a very thick epidermis. 



5. In some, these fascicles are ovate-circular, in others 

 acute elongate and densely arranged, radiating from the 

 often very marginal center and giving the appearance of 

 hosts of maggots pressing for a common center. This 

 species is generally a very flat trunk and has grown in the 

 form of thick planks 2 to 3 in. thick and i ^ ft. broad, not 

 caused by compression, but by natural growth. 



6. All the fascicles end abruptly with an outward ten- 

 dency from the center, giving evidence that thev were not 

 aerial roots, but were each a system of a stem constituting 

 the plant proper. 



7 . It would be most anomalous for a bulk of aerial 

 roots 9 ft. in circumference to issue from a cylindric center, 

 representing the trunk of a fern one inch in diameter. 



8. Here is a section of a stem with polished surface, 

 not indicating any cyJindric center whatever. Where these 

 supposed aerial roots came from to combine and cause a 

 growth like this is rather mysterious and must be quite an 

 aerial supposition. There is not even an interstitial paren- 

 chyma visible; all fascicles are a dense growth. 



9. In my collection there are two of the lower extremi- 



