

XLVl] CUPRESSINOCLADUS 309 



(ii) Species previously referred to Thujopsis. 



Cupressinocladus massiliensis (Saporta). The small twigs de- 

 scribed by Saporta from Provence as Thujopsis massiliensis^ and 

 compared by him with Thuya occidentalis are very similar to those 

 named by the same author T. europaea 2 \ in neither case is there 

 any justification for the use of the generic name Thujopsis. Heer 3 

 records T. europaea from Miocene beds in Greenland and in a later 

 account adopts the name Biota orientalis on the ground of the 

 occurrence of imperfect cones and elongated cone-scales comparable 

 with those of Biota (Thuya), but the figured specimens are too 

 indistinct to warrant the employment of the generic term Thuites 

 in the more restricted sense advocated above. Goeppert and 

 Menge 4 refer some fragments from the Baltic amber beds to 

 Thujopsis europaea, but no reproductive organs are figured. 



(iii) Species previously referred to Thuya or Thuites. 



Several Jurassic and Lower Cretaceous specimens formerly 

 included in Thuites are now transferred to Brachyphyllum on the 

 ground that the choice of one or other of these names has fre- 

 quently been determined by characters that are both inconstant 

 and of little morphological importance. There are, however, 

 several examples of Coniferous shoots from Mesozoic and Tertiary 

 strata that are clearly distinguished from such types as Thuites 

 expansa (= Brachyphyllum expansum), in which the verticillate 

 arrangement of the leaves is not a well marked or constant feature, 

 by the very regular disposition of appressed leaves in decussate 

 pairs as in recent species of Libocedrus and some other Cupres- 

 sineae : for this form of shoot the generic name Cupressinocladus 

 is now adopted. 



Cupressinocladus valdensis Seward. 



A species described as Thuites valdensis 5 from a single specimen 

 from Wealden beds on the Sussex coast, characterised by decussate 

 appressed leaves with a comparatively long basal portion con- 

 crescent with the axis of the branch and a free short triangular 



1 Saporta (65) p. 72, PL i. fig. 6; PL iv. fig. 2. 



2 /6*d..(65 2 ) PL i. fig. 5. 



3 Heer (68) i. p. 90, PL L. fig. 11; (75) iii. p. 7, PL i. figs. 1329. 



4 Goeppert and Menge (83) A. PL xvi. figs. 215217. 



5 Seward (95) A. p. 209, PL xx. fig. 6. 



