GEOLOGY AND PALEONTOLOGY OF THE CANAL ZONE. 39 



The modern species of Mespilodaphne are numerous, inhabiting 

 Africa and tropical America, and are often united with Oreodaphne 

 and Strychnodaphne to form the composite genus Ocotea of Aublet. 

 Their fossil history is almost entirely lost in the multitude of species 

 that have been referred to the form genera Laurus and Laurophyl- 

 lum. Mespilodaphne is abundant and varied throughout the Eocene 

 and Oligocene of the Mississippi embayment area. 



Occurrence. — Culebra formation, upper part. East wall of the 

 Gaillard Cut just north of Canal Zone station 1760. (Collected by 

 M. I. Goldman.) 



Order MYRTALES. 



» 



Family MYRTACEAE. 



Genus CALYPTRANTHES Swartz. 



CALYPTRANTHES GATUNENSIS, new species. 



Plate 18, fig. 1. 



Description.— leaves broadly oblong-elliptic in general outline, 

 widest in the middle and tapering equally in both directions to the 

 abruptly acute apex and base. Margins entire. Texture subcoria- 

 ceous. Length between 7 cm. and 8 cm. Maximum width between 

 3.5 cm. and 4 cm. Petiole missing. Midrib stout, somewhat curved, 

 prominent on the lower surface of the leaf. Secondaries thin, very 

 numerous, and close set, often inosculating by forking; they diverge 

 from the midrib at angles averaging about 70 degrees, at intervals 

 of 1 mm. to 3 mm., pursue a but slightly curved outwardly ascending 

 course and have their ends united by an aerodrome vein on each 

 edge of the lamina parallel with and from 1 mm. to 2 mm. within 

 the margin. Tertiaries forming open isodiametric polygonal meshes. 



The present well-marked species closely resembles the only other 

 named fossil form Calyptranthes eocenica Berry from the lower 

 Eocene of the Mississippi embayment (Wilcox Group). It may also 

 be compared with the slightly smaller Myrtus rectinervis described 

 by Saporta 1 from the Sannoisian of southeastern France. 



The genus Calyptranthes, which is exclusively American in the 

 existing flora, has about seventy species ranging from Mexico and 

 the West Indies to southern Brazil. There is a strong generic like- 

 ness between the leaves of all of the species. Calyptranthes zyzygium 

 De Candolle may be mentioned, among others, as a form with leaves 

 almost exactly like the fossil. There is also a marked family resem- 

 blance to some of the existing tropical American species of Eugenia, 

 and more especially Myrcia, Myrcia multiflora De Candolle from 

 the Guianas being very similar to the present species. 



1 Saporta, Etudes, vol. 1, p. 251, pi. 11, fig. 5, 1863. 



