THE 
GHOLOGICAL MAGAZINE. 
No. XVI.—OCTOBER 1865. 
ORIGINAL ARTICLES. 
——-+— 
I.—On AN UNDESCRIBED CONE FROM THE CARBONIFEROUS BEDS 
oF AIRDRIE, LANARKSHIRE. 
By Wiu1am CarrvutTuers, F.1.8., of the British Museum. 
(Plate XII.) 
ese disc-shaped bodies have frequently been noticed in coal 
and the accompanying shales. Specimens were figured by Mr. 
Prestwich in 1840, in his paper on the Geology of Coalbrook Dale 
(Geol. Trans., Second Series, vol. v., tab. xxxviii., ff 8, 8a); and 
Professor Morris, who described Mr. Prestwich’s fossils, echaracter- 
ises them as ‘capsules’ of his Lepidodendron longibracteatum.* 
But it does not appear from either the illustrations of the two 
spikes of his species, or from the letter-press, that he had found the 
capsules associated with the reniform thec of the spikes. Prof. 
Balfour has also figured and described similar bodies in a paper read 
before the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1854. He found them 
in the ‘ splint-coal’ of Fordel, near Inverkeithing, in Fife. He Says, 
‘ Besides Sigillarias and Stigmarias, we also detect in the Fordel Coal 
peculiar rounded organisms which have the appearance of seeds. 
Dr. Fleming informs me that similar bodies have been observed by 
him in coal, and that he exhibited them to Mr. Witham about twenty 
years ago. ‘They have also been seen by Dr. Fleming in Lochgelly 
and Arniston “ parrot,” and in the coal at Boghead ; and from having 
observed them in “ cherry,” “splint,” and “cannel” coals, he is dis- 
posed to consider them as a somewhat common feature. I have seen 
them in coal from Miller Hill, near Dalkeith, as well as in the coal 
from Fife. They appear to be certainly allied to the fructification 
of the Lycopodiacee of the present day, more particularly to that 
form of it which consists of two valves placed in apposition and 
* Prof. Morris referred this plant to Lycopodites with a query: he now considers 
it a true Lepidodendron. 
VOL. II.—NO. XVI. 121g) 
