188 Mr J. M. Macfarlane on LepidopJdoios. 



work the shales overlying the sandstone quarry of Hailes. 

 These are of a very fine-grained and foliated nature, and 

 of a deep black colour. Admirably preserved in the folia3 

 of the strata I found numerous plant remains, prominent 

 among which, for their abundance, were the isolated twigs 

 and cones now under consideration, as also in less abun- 

 dance the twigs and cones still united, but, with the excep- 

 tion of a thin Halonia branch, not a trace have I obtained 

 otherwise of Lepidophloios. On the other hand, the bitu- 

 minous shales of Straiten, Dalraeny, and Add ie well, have 

 yielded me abundant examples of the larger Halonia and 

 Lepidophloios branches, but not a scrap of the thin twigs 

 so abundant at Hailes. Lastly, in the Calcareous shales of 

 Grange, near Burntisland, and the limestone of Burdie- 

 house and Camps, we find all the forms mixed indis- 

 criminately together. Here is a valuable lesson to the 

 palseontological botanist. The fine shales of Hailes and 

 the Water of Leith valley seem to have been deposited in 

 calm waters, at a considerable distance, probably, from some 

 river's mouth. Here delicate fern-fronds, small twigs, and 

 light cones — floated further than the heavier and more 

 massive stems to which they belonged — were quietly 

 deposited and covered by fine mud. The bituminous 

 shales were probably formed nearer land where currents 

 were frequent, as is shown by the irregular beddings of 

 the rock, and the large stems which they contain, and 

 from tlie decay of these vegetable organisms, we have, I 

 think, the origin of the bitumen for which these shales are 

 i'amed. The Burdiehouse series of rocks again appear, at 

 least partly, to have been laid down in lagoons or large 

 ])Ools teeming with Cypris, and into these were whirled 

 large and small organs alike. 



The slender cone-stalk has downwardly directed and 

 imbricated leaf-cushions, rhomboidalor more nearly elliptical 

 leaf-scars, each with three fibro-vascular impressions and 

 linear leaves. These leaves are from | to 1| inch in length, 

 and stand out from the twigs at an angle of from 45° to 75°. 

 The twigs or cone-bearing branches seem to have dichoto- 

 mised comparatively seldom, as I have not been able, out of 

 tlie hundreds of specimens which Hailes has yielded me, to 

 obtain a single example of such, one dug out by me from 



