368 PLANT-REMAINS OF DOUBTFUL AFFINITY, ETC. 



absolutely nothing but badly preserved fragments of Lepidodendron. This 

 decision appears to some extent forced and improbable, even in the case of 

 the above remains, but it is shown to be without foundation by the many 

 fine specimens which have been found in the clay-ironstone workings in 

 the Coal-measures of Coalbrookdale (Palaeoxyris helicteroides, Morris). I 

 have seen these remains in a hundred forms in the finest preservation in 

 the British Museum, to which they had been recently removed through the 

 purchase of a large local collection. 



These Spirangiae are peculiar fusiform bodies, in which we can distin- 

 guish an ovoid enlarged middle portion and two long extremities which 

 narrow gradually in the form of a cone. They are usually found singly on 

 the planes of stratification ; but specimens of Spirangium Jugleri are not 

 uncommon in the Wealden, in which several of the fusiform bodies are 

 borne in an umbel on the top of a thin filiform stalk, on which there is no* 

 appearance of nodes or appendages of any kind. The surface of the whole 

 body is marked with sharp ribs, usually six in number, which wind spirally 

 round it once or one and a half times, and then straighten themselves out 

 at the conical extremity. In consequence of the strong compression the 

 edges of the two sides are often seen simultaneously, and these cutting one 

 another necessarily produce rhombic areolae. This appearance is particu- 

 larly striking in the specimen first described by Brongniart, and hence he l 

 took the whole object for a flowering spike and the areolae for imbricated 

 bracts. He compared it with the spikes of the genus Xyris and chose its 

 name accordingly. Ettingshausen perceived Brongniart's error, and supposed 

 that there were six valve-like twisted bract-scales surrounding a central body. 

 But I do not understand from this how he arrived at a comparison with the 

 inflorescences of Aechmea, Pourretia, and Bromelia. By Quenstedt Spiran- 

 gium is compared with Cycadeae. Schenk 2 with a greater show of reason 

 suggests for comparison the fructifications of Helicteres with their spirally 

 twisted carpels, but does not express any decided opinion. Schimper also 

 simply places the plant with 'genera incertae sedis? Nathorst has recently 

 attempted to work out the comparison with Characeae ; he sees in Spiran- 

 giae gigantic sporangia of Charae surrounded by spirally twisted envelope- 

 tubes. The lateral boundaries of these tubes are supposed to correspond, 

 as in Chara, with the screw-lines. His work is written unfortunately in the 

 Swedish tongue, with which I, like most botanists, am unacquainted, so that 

 I can only refer to reports upon it. Now that I have had the opportunity 

 of examining carefully the numerous specimens of Spirangium Jugleri in the 

 collection at Marburg, and also the large series from the Carboniferous 

 formation in the British Museum, I can only say with Schenk 3 that 

 Nathorst's view is the most attractive, but that it is impossible to obtain 



Brongniart (4), p. 133. * Schenk (3), p. 197. 3 Zittel (1), p. 394. 



