CONIFERAE. 71 



nothing of their inner structure, narrow below into the branch and are 

 composed of spirally arranged scales, the rounded apex of the scale being 

 marked by three deep longitudinal fold-like furrows. In this case therefore 

 branches resembling those of Cupressineae bear cones with the outward 

 characters of Araucarieae, and we see again how careful we must be in 

 identifying separate bits of branches. In the genus Cyparissidium, described 

 by Heer l from the Urgonian beds of Greenland and afterwards found by 

 Nathorst 2 in the Rhaetic beds of Schonen, the ovoid cones are composed 

 of scales which have pretty much the shape of those of our pines, and are 

 arranged in spirals and appear to be striated on the back. These cones, 

 as we learn from a small fragment of wood preserved at the back of one of 

 them, belong to branches which have close-pressed scale-like spirally ar- 

 ranged leaves and irregular ramifications, and remind us of Widdringtonia. 

 Quite similar branches also lie beside the cones of the Swedish Cyparis- 

 sidium septentrionale, Nath., so that supported by the case of Heer's fossil 

 we may fairly assume that the two belong to one another. I cannot find 

 that the species recently described by Velenovsky 3 from the Cenomanian 

 beds of Bohemia, C. minimum, Vel., and C. pulchellum, Vel., agreed very 

 exactly with the structure of the cone in the original type. The genus 

 Sphenolepidium, Heer (Sphenolepis, Schenk) is also very imperfectly 

 understood, and the structure of the cone is altogether doubtful. The 

 species first discovered, S. Sternbergianum and S. Kurrianum, come from 

 the Wealden of Hanover 4 . Saporta 5 has described one very like them, 

 S. Terquemi, from the Rhaetic beds of the country round Metz. How far 

 Heer's 6 new species from the Wealden of the North of Portugal really 

 belong to this genus I should be unwilling to say without examination of 

 the original specimens. The small spherical or ovoid cones appear in fas- 

 cicles on the extremities of the branches ; they have the habit of those of 

 Sequoia and consist of spirally arranged scales, which become narrow and 

 wedge-shaped below and are obtuse above, and lie close at first but subse- 

 quently open and spread out. According to Saporta the apex of the scale 

 developes into a scutiform expansion, as in Sequoia ; the number and 

 position of the seeds is altogether uncertain. Heer's figures of his Portuguese 

 forms agree but little with Saporta's and Schenk's descriptions. The apex 

 of the scales appears to be longitudinally striated, and there is no indication 

 of the scutiform terminal formation. We are not compelled however to con- 

 clude that there is certainly any essential difference, for the text says : 'The 

 cones are strongly compressed, and it is very difficult to determine the 

 form of the scales.' When the palaeontologist speaks thus, every doubt is 



1 Heer (5), vol. 3 n, t. 19 ; vol. 6 n, t. 28 ; vol. 71, t. 48. * Nathorst (3), t. 4. 



3 Velenovsky (1), t. 9, ff. 6, 7, and t. 5, f. 5. * Schenk (1). 5 de Saporta (4), vol. iii, t. 198. 

 6 Heer (14). 



