XLV] ARATJCARINEAE 301 



Albertia is too imperfect to be determined; it may be identical 

 with those referred by the same author to Voltzia. 



The abundance and wide distribution of wood with Araucarian 

 features in Palaeozoic rocks though, for reasons already stated, 

 not admissible as proof of the occurrence of members of the 

 Araucarineae, at least shows the great antiquity and predominance 

 of the Araucarian type. There can be no reasonable doubt that 

 much of the wood described in Chapter xxxin. as Dadoxylon 

 belonged to Araucarian plants, more -especially the examples 

 furnished by Mesozoic and Tertiary strata. In considering the 

 past history of the family the evidence of the wood must be taken 

 into account. 



The conclusions drawn from a survey of the fossil records are : 

 (i) the type represented by Araucaria is older than that now illus- 

 trated by Agathis. In other words Araucaria possesses features, 

 especially those associated with the megastrobili, which extend 

 farther back without departing far from the existing type than is the 

 case with Agathis. (ii) The Araucarineae foreshadowed in the later 

 Carboniferous and earlier Permian periods were in all probability 

 established as a family in Ehaetic times, and in the Jurassic and 

 earlier Cretaceous periods the Araucarine,ae were almost cosmo- 

 politan and represented by numerous forms, (iii) Such evidence 

 as is afforded by Tertiary records, though meagre and often in- 

 complete, points to the continued existence of the family in the 

 Northern Hemisphere at least in the older Tertiary floras. 



