DESCRIPTION OF SOME FOSSIL PLANTS FROM THE GREAT FALLS 
COAL FIELD OF MONTANA. 
BY 
Wittiam M. FonrtraIne. 
(With Plates LXXXII—LXxXxXIV.) 
In July, 1890, Mr. F. H. Knowlton and Dr. A. C. Peale made a smal 
collection of fossil plants from the Kootanie group of Great Falls, Mont. 
In July, 1891, Mr. W.H. Weed made an additional small collection 
from the same locality. These plants have been placed in my hands 
for determination and description. Thé object of this paper is to give 
an account of them. Both collections can be contained in a box of 
moderate size, so that they can not pretend to be exhaustive. 
The specimens show nothing but ferns, conifers, and one Equisetum. 
The conifers have but few species, and the specimens illustrating each 
Species are few and poorly presezved. They indicate considerable 
maceration, as if they had been floated in water a long while before 
they were covered with sediment. 
The ferns predominate in the number of species, while the specimens 
illustrating the species are in several cases very numerous. They are 
usually well preserved and appear to have been speedily entombed in 
sediment. 
Both Mr. Knowlton and Mr. Weed seem to have failed to find eyeads, 
the other constituent of a typical Mesozoic flora. They, however, exist 
at the Great Falls locality, for Dr. Newberry, in his excellent paper on 
the flora of this group, * has mentioned and described several. Besides 
these a beautiful impression of a eyead, obtained by Mr. R. 8. Williams 
from this field, is figured and described in this paper. 
The cycads, however, so far as I can learn, are rare in this flora. 
Perhaps this is accounted for by the localities in which they grow and 
by the accidents of preservation. The condition of the fossil conifers 
found in this field, and their small proportion in the sum total of the 
Great Falls plants, indicate that the inhabitants of the higher and 
drier regions were not favored in preservation so much as the ferns, 
which presumably lived in the marshes and near to the water receiving 
sediment. Then, too, itis quite possible that additional discoveries may 
add largely to both the conifers and cyeads. Negative conclusions, 
March, 1891, p. 191. 
Proceedings National Museum, Vol. XV—No, 918. 487 
