DESCRIPTIONS OF SPECIES. 19 



Sequoia gracillima (Lesq.) Newb. 

 PI. XIV, fig. 6; XXVI, fig'. 9. ? 



Glyptostrobus graciUimus Lesq. Am. Journ. Sci., Vol. XL VI (July, 1868), p. 92; 



Cret. PI. (1874), p. 52, PI. I, figs. 8, 11-llf. 

 "Cone of Sequoia (not described)." Ills. Cret. and Tert. PI. (1878), PI. XI, fig. 9. 



Lesquereux described (loc. cit.) a conifer which occurs frequently in 

 the Dakota group in Nebraska, and also in the Cretaceous strata of New 

 Jersey. It is characterized by a great number of slender, almost filiform, 

 branches covered with acute lanceolate or ovate, sometimes subulate, leaves. 

 Lesquereux speaks of their occurring in whorls of three, but in the large 

 number of specimens before me I can find no evidence of a verticillate 

 arrangement, and they seem to surround the stems spirally. They differ 

 considerably in length, but the foliage can hardly be said to be dimorphous 

 as in Glyptostrobus, Sequoia, and many other conifers, but usually on the 

 older branches they are more closely appressed, more spreading above. 

 Lesquereux compares this plant with Frenela of Australia, and suggests 

 that it may be identical with Ettingshausen's Frenelites Eeichii, from the 

 chalk of Niederschcena, It has been my good fortune to obtain a number 

 of cones of this plant, both from Nebraska and New Jersey, and I am 

 able, therefore, to give a more complete description of it than has been 

 heretofore possible. The cones are cylindrical, 2 to 2£ inches in length, one- 

 half inch in diameter, and are formed of relatively large peltate scales, each 

 with an umbilicus and central tubercle. [See PI. XXVI, fig. 9. ?] This is a 

 totally different cone from that of Glyptostrobus, in which the divisions are 

 squamiform with a fanlike, crenulated margin. The form of scale in the 

 cones before us is similar to that of Sequoia and Taxodium, but the cones 

 of the latter are usually globular, while those of Sequoia are often elongated, 

 sometimes subcylindrical. The character of the foilage is near to that of 

 some of the Sequoias, S gigantea and S. Couttsice, for example, while in Glyp- 

 tostrobus the two forms of foliage are much more distinctly marked, the 

 short appressed leaves closely investing the branches, resembling those 

 before us, the open foliage quite different. The foliage of this plant is found 

 in considerable abundance in the sandy layers of the Cretaceous on the 

 Raritan River, and the cones were formerly numerous in the clay beds at 

 Keyport, where they were associated with great quantities of lignite, very 



