410 MESOZOIC FLORAS OF UNITED STATES. 



Tyson called it so, and not only the flora but the estuarine character of many of 

 the beds agreed with this. 



And in another letter written ten days later announcing the ship- 

 ment of the trunk he adds : 



As to the supposed Wealden equivalency of the beds, I have found no printed 

 reference. When I was in Baltimore in 1869 I was delivering some lectures at the 

 Peabody Institute on the origin of coal, and naturally inquired as to fossil plants. 

 Tyson, whose acquaintance I had made sometime before, showed me his cycads 

 and took me to see the excavations for iron ore, in which we found some coniferous 

 wood. I saw no other fossils, but heard that leaves had been found. The cycads 

 and the structure of the conifers sufficed to show that the beds were probably Meso- 

 zoic and newer than the Richmond coal field, at that time, I think, regarded as 

 Jurassic. Hence it was natural to regard them as equivalent to the Wealden, and 

 probably older than the marine greensands farther north. That was my conclu- 

 sion from the little that I saw, and was so entered in my notes at the time; but I 

 do not think I published anything, though I may have referred to it incidentally 

 m later publications. 



He was quite right in saying that the trunk sent was different from 

 that shown in the photograph. The latter was a view of one of the t3^pe 

 specimens of Cycadeoidea niarylandica, while the former belongs to my 

 C. Bibbinsi. I described the trunk fully in June of the same year and 

 had two views prepared, which are reproduced in the present paper on 

 PL LXXXII. (See pp. 416, 456.) 



While on the subject of Mr. Tyson's specimens, I will mention two 

 other cases which are certain and a third doubtful case. Sometime 

 after Doctor Newberry's death Dr. Arthur HoUick found among his 

 effects an unmounted photograph of a cycad, and by the side of it three 

 large pieces of petrified wood. On the back of the print was written in 

 Doctor Newberry's handwriting: "Cycadeoidea, Trias ? Maryland. From 

 Professor Tyson." Knowing that I was at the time making a special study 

 of Maryland cycads, Doctor Holhck kindly sent it to me. It is reproduced 

 in this paper on PL LXXXI. The trunk can be readily recognized as the 

 type figured bj^ Professor Fontaine on pi. cbcxx of his Potomac Flora, 

 but so tilted as to show considerable of the base. It is the Johns Hop- 

 kins University type No. 1 (Cycadeoidea marylandica) . (See p. 414.) 



In one of Mr. F. B. Meek's volumes of " Miscellaneous Papers," bound 

 together and now in the library of the National Museum, containing Mr. 

 Tyson's second report inscribed by him to Mr. Meek, there is a photo- 



