MUSEUM OF COMI'ARATIVE ZOOLOGY. 245 



Conifers. — Leaves of JValchia loncjifolia Goepp. No. 20. 



Leaves of Abietitcs Goepp. Fragments iu many specimens. No. 21. 



Leaves of Ullmannia frtimentaria Goepp., and U. Bronnii, No. 1, abound. 



Branches and leaves of JValchia piniformis, No. 3, in plenty of specimens. 

 CoRPAiTE.E. — Cordaites borassifoliiLS Ung. Very fine specimen. No. 4. 



Fragments of leaves of Cordaites species. No 22. 



Cardiocarpus orbicularis Goepp. No. 24. 



Cardiocarpm species nov., allied to C. gibberosus Gein. No. 25. 



Carpolithes species, one referable to C. humidus Heer, the other, very 

 small but in plenty of specimens, to C. Geinitzi Heer, Perm. Ptl. of 

 Funkirchen, PI. XXIl. figs. 5, 6, 7, 8, and 13. These are all mixed 

 with ground fragments of scales, leave-s etc. of JFalchia and Ullmannia. 

 No. 26. Same as No. 16 of the collection of the Museum of Comparative 

 Zoology. 



On the above species of vegetable remains I add a few remarks in 

 regard to their evidence for the determination of the age of the forma- 

 tion where they have been found. 



The genus Spheno2)hylluni ranges from the Silurian to the base of the 

 Permian, as far as known, at least, by the present state of our knowl- 

 edge in vegetable palasontology. Three species of the genus are recorded 

 by German authors, as from the Permian : Sphenophylluni SchlrAheimii, 

 S. emarginatum, and S. longifolium. But all are from the lower strata 

 of the Old Red Sandstone, whose flora is so intimately connected by its 

 characters with that of the Upper Carboniferous that the exact limita- 

 tion between the formations has not been fixed. It is the same with 

 the Permo-Caz*boniferous strata of Virginia, wherefrom a number of spe- 

 cies of Sphenophylhim are described by White and Fontaine. Here we 

 are not yet in the true Permian. A very small and obscure fragment of 

 a Sphenophyllum species is described by Geinitz, Nachtr. zur Dyas, I., 

 p. 10, PI. L figs. 22, 23. It is as yet the only trace of the genus in 

 the Middle Permian. The specific characters are not discernible, and 

 the author remarks that he has published it onh'^ because it is as yet the 

 only species of Splienophyllum found in the Permian of Germany, The 

 presence of two species of this genus in the specimens of Fairplay would 

 be already sufficient authority for referring the formation to the paleo- 

 zoic time. 



In the Ferns, the specimens represent Xeuropteris Loschii, a species 

 found already in the whole thickness of the Carboniferous, and also in the 

 Permian of Europe. Pecoptei^is arhorescens, Upper Carboniferous and 

 Lower Permian. Callipteris conferta, one of the more abundant species of 

 the Permian in Europe, and found until now on this continent only in 



