438 F. Chapman — Haliserites in Falceozoic Rocks, Australia. 



III. — On the Occuerence of Haliserites in the Upper Silurian 

 AND Upper Devonian Rocks of Victoria, Australia. 



By Fredk. Chapman, A.L.S., F.E.M.S., Palaeontologist to the National Museum, 



Melbourne. 



(PLATE XXII.) 

 Preliminary Observations. 



DURING the last few years there have passed through my hands 

 for determination many specimens of a twig-like fossil-plant from 

 the highest Silurian flaggy-sandstones of Victoria. These were usually 

 too fragmentary to afford any very decided evidence as to their affinity, 

 although their surfaces showed a close-textured and well-defined 

 structure, referable to that of prosenchymatous wood-cells, and the 

 stem had a definite central vascular axis, such as was first noticed by 

 Hugh Miller in similar fossil remains from the Old Red Sandstone of 

 Scotland. 



Quite recently, however, the collectors of the Victorian Geological 

 Survey have secured some better examples, chiefly from the Matlock 

 district in Gippsland, which show not only the stem-like fragments 

 well preserved, but also occasional imbrications or spiny bract-like 

 leaves attached to the stems, together with short ovate (?) leaves and 

 sporangia, and inrolled terminations to the branches. A good com- 

 parative series of Haliserites Beclienianus, Goppert, from the Devonian 

 of Lethen, Nairnshire, Scotland, as well as from Wassenach, Laacher 

 See, in the National Museum collection, afforded ample evidence as 

 to the common identity of these and the Silurian fossils from 

 Gippsland. 



Remarks on the Genus. 



Carruthers has already shown ^ that the genera Haliserites, Sternberg, 

 and Psilophyton, Dawson,^ are identical ; but he has retained the latter 

 generic name for the plant, notwithstanding that Goppert's species, 

 H. Lechenianus,^ was fully established by descriptions and drawings 

 in 1852 as a form of Haliserites, whilst Dawson's description of 

 Psilophyton rohustius did not appear until 1859.* Kidston, whose 

 synonymy of the species above quoted should be consulted, follows 

 Carruthers in selecting Psilophyton in the place of the earlier described 

 genus.* 



In all probability the generic term Haliserites was discarded by the 

 above-mentioned authors on account of the more perfect preservation 

 of Dawson's specimens, which consequently lent themselves to the 

 framing of a better diagnosis of the genus than was possible with 

 Goppert's specimens ; but the fact that the two genera were shown 

 to be identical renders it clear that the earlier name, in accordance 

 with the rule of priority, should be retained for this plant-form. 



1 Journ. Bot., n.s., vol. ii (Nov. 1873), No. 131, pp. 321-7, pi. 137. 

 » Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc, vol. xv (1859), p. 478. 

 3 " Foss. Flora d. Ubergangs," 1852, p. 88, pi. ii. 

 * Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc, vol. xv, p. 481, figs. 2a, b. 

 s " Cat. PaltTOZoic Pknts, Brit. Mus.," 1886, p. 232. 



