102 DESCKIPIIVE CATALOGUE 



AFFINITIES. The species of Pityoxylon described from the 

 Cretaceous are few, and with none of them does this new 

 species shoAv any close affinity. In geological age and geo- 

 graphical distribution the three French species described by 

 niche (1S96) from the Albian are the nearest, but in the 

 essential point the character of the ray-cells these specimens 

 differ widely. 



The Upper Cretaceous specimens from Staten Island and 

 Cliffwood, N.J., however, are well preserved and described 

 in detail. Of these, P. state nense and P. ycitua tense t Jeffrey & 

 Chrysler (1906j, being Avithout ray-tracheids, cannot be near 

 our fossil. Pin us scituatensiformis, Bailey (1911), has ray- 

 tracheids, as can be seen well in the tangential photographs 

 of this wood given by Bailey. Unfortunately, he does not. 

 illustrate adequately the radial view of these tracheids, so that 

 it is impossible to see how closely they agree in detail with 

 those in the older British specimen. In possessing thick-walled 

 ray-parenchyma, and also in the grouping of parenchyraa- 

 cells round the resin-canals, the American and the British 

 fossils resemble each other. The existence of thick-walled and 

 resinous parenchyma-cells is a feature which Bailey con- 

 siders " without parallel among living pines," while it is found 

 in other Cretaceous specimens. Bailey is fortunate in having 

 pith and the shoit-shoot bases in his specimen, which ours 

 lacks, and which confirm his determination of the species as 

 referable to Pinvs. In this American species the ray-tracheids 

 are more feebly developed than in the much older British form, 

 and while these two resemble each other more closely than any 

 other described fossils, they are not identical. 



Of the three species from Cliffwood, described by Miss Holden 

 (1913 A), two have no ray-tracheids and therefore do not come 

 near our fossil, while the third, which has ray-tracheids, has 

 also the well-marked " teeth " projecting from the horizontal 

 walls which are characteristic of the "-hard" pines of to-day, 

 though not developed in our fossil, 



Pitj/oxylon Aldersoni, Knowlton (see Knowlton, 1899 B, 

 p. 7^3), is apparently too imperfectly preserved for any 

 accurate comparison to be attempted. Knowlton does not 

 describe the pitting of the medullary ray-cells, but in his 

 photograph of the tangential section some of the rays look 



