STIGMARIA. 281 



appendages still attached and spreading obliquely like rays from a central 

 mass. The ideal longitudinal section appended by the authors gives there- 

 fore the outline of a cupola or dome to the entire branch-system. Their 

 conclusions from these facts, with the aid of the knowledge which had been 

 previously gained, are as follows : i. That Stigmaria was a land-plant of low 

 growth, whose branches spread regularly from the common centre, and at 

 length branched dichotomously. They are not certain whether the ' domed 

 centre ' is a generic character or not ; they think it possible that the plant 

 grew on a small hillock, from which its branches spread downwards in 

 every direction. 2. That it was a succulent Dicotyledon. This is con- 

 cluded from Steinhauer's previously mentioned observations on the central 

 cylinder. 3. That the roundish scars on the surface are the places where 

 the leaves have separated from the stem. It is cautiously concluded from 

 their regular quincuncial disposition all round the ste*m that they could 

 not properly have been roots. 4. That these leaves were cylindrical and 

 fleshy. The authors rightly attach little value to comparisons with certain 

 groups of Dicotyledons, for ' it must be confessed that this is but a rude 

 kind of analogy 1 .' Fourteen other similar specimens were soon after dis- 

 covered in the same mine, some of which were removed from it. These 

 too were discussed by Lindley and Hutton in the Introduction to the 

 second volume of their work 2 . One of the specimens removed from the 

 mine, showing the upper side, is figured in the same work 3 . From the 

 fact that the appendages spread at right angles in every direction and lie 

 across the bedding, it is concluded that the plants grew ' in the soft mud 

 most likely of still and shallow water.' These views, which accorded well 

 with the state of knowledge at the time, were generally accepted not in 

 England only but also on the Continent, where they found warm supporters 

 especially in Corda 4 and Sternberg 5 , and in Goppert 6 also, though 

 the latter, doubtful about their affinity with Dicotyledons, preferred to 

 regard them as ' cryptogamous Monocotyledons,' or as intermediate forms 

 connecting Lycopodiae with Cycadeae. 



An entirely new impulse was given to the question in the years 1845 

 and 1846 by Binney's 7 discovery of erect stumps of Sigillaria-stems, each 

 of which terminated below in four root-branches with the character of 

 Stigmariae. The three first specimens were discovered as early as 1843 

 at St. Helen's near Manchester. When they came to be examined, they 

 had already suffered great damage through exposure, and if there can be 

 no doubt of their being Sigillariae, yet their Stigmaria-roots were not too 

 convincing, especially in the figure. But the stump with roots discovered 



1 Lindley and Hutton (1), vol. i, p. 109. 2 Lindley and Hutton (1), vol. ii, p. 12. 



3 Lindley and Hutton (1), vol. ii, p. if. * Corda (1). * Sternberg, Graf von (1), Heft 



5-8, and Supplement. ' Goppert (1). 7 Binney (5) and (6). 



