^°l89o!"'J PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL MUSEUM, 7 



globular, or roand-flatteued, one-fourth of a millimeter in diameter or 

 less, are irregularly spread, but more abundantly along the borders of 

 the tubule or in the thickness of its peripheric horizontal filaments, 

 but seen also upon the exposed surface of the matter filling the tube. 



The fossil fragment is that of an Alga referable by its texture to the 

 Chordariacece Agardh, an order of the Melanospenme or olive-colored 

 algfe, agreeing in its essential characters with those of the genus Ghor- 

 claria of Agardb, as described in "Nereis Bor. Am.," by Harvey, I, p. 123, 

 as having ^^ Frond cylindrical, cartilaginous, solid, hollow in the center 

 coated ivith a pile of radiating horizontal peripheric filaments, spores clavate 

 or ohovate arising from the base of the filaments and concealed among them.''^ 

 Adding to this the remark in the description of the genus Halymenites 

 in Schimper's Paleontologie Vegetale, Vol. i, p. 193, ^^ sporangia puncti- 

 form, immersed in the texture of the frond,^^ the affinity is forcibly rec- 

 ognized. For as seen marked upon the enlarged part of the fossil 

 organism, figured at la, even the radiating filaments are observable 

 with the lens as well as the numerous black sporangia. 



The specimen is remarkable and of great value, for until now very 

 few fossil remains of marine plants have been discovered with their in- 

 ternal texture in such a state of preservation that its characters were 

 possibly discernible. One or two specimens only of that kind are re- 

 corded by paleobotanists. 



Habitat.— Upper Helderberg limestone, Sandusky, Ohio. Collector, 

 Rev. H. Herzer, to whom the speices is dedicated. 



Cylindrites striatus sp. nov. 

 PI. I, Figs. 2, 3. 



Frond forking at base in two cylindrical simple branches obliquely diverging, I to 

 l^cra in diameter; surface striate lengthwise; stria thick, filiform, generally continu- 

 ous, parallel, straight, but traced like short irregular wrinkles, curved or obliquely 

 serpentine at some places. 



Two specimens partly figured represent the species. The branches 

 emerging from an irregularly nodose or tuberculose protuberance, fork- 

 ing near the base, diverge at an acute angle (20° to 25°), are exactly cyl- 

 indrical and apparently simple. The preserved parts in both specimens, 

 Scm long, do not bear any branches, but in specimen No. 2 they are trav- 

 ersed at various angles by other stems, also simi>le, passing under or 

 above them. 



The branches are clearly detached from the surface or merely super- 

 posed upon it by the lower face, so that as seen in Fig. 2 the cross section 

 is exactly circular and therefore appears in relief, and the spaces be- 

 tween the stems remain free of deposited matter as deep, irregular con- 

 cavities. The stems are entirely petrified, the inner part of the cylin- 

 der being filled by amorphous matter of apparently the same compound 

 as that of the rock under them, a hard calcareous or argillaceous soft- 

 grained stone mixed with minute scaly shining micaceous particles. 



