THE 



GEOLOGICAL MAGAZINE. 



NEW SERIES. DECADE III. VOL. III. 



No. V.— MAY, 1886. 



o:R,ia-i:E>r-A_ij abtigles. 



I. — On Mesozoic Angiospekms. 



By J. Starkie Gardner, F.L.S., F.G.S. 



(PLATE V.) 



THERE can scarcely at the present time be a problem more in- 

 teresting than that of the first appearance of Angiosperms, nor 

 one regarding which there is less trustworthy information at the 

 disposal of the geologist. In attempting to bring together a sum- 

 mary of what is known regarding the earlier forms of this most 

 important division of the vegetable kingdom, I make little claim to 

 originality ; nor are such criticisms as I may venture upon entitled 

 to the same weight as if put forward by a trained botanist. 



It is quite unnecessary to recall the many supposed representatives 

 of Angiosperms that were formerly included in the Palasozoic Floras, 

 for they have long since been dismissed from our lists of fossils and 

 forgotten. Though less fanciful in degree than some of the still 

 earlier geological fallacies, they are no less mythical, and at present 

 the names Yuccites, Palmacites, Antholites, Poacites, Culmites, etc., 

 are no longer included among the plants of the Coal-measures. Now 

 that Pothocites has been shown to be part of a Sigillarian plant, there 

 is in fact no longer any Angiosperm remaining of Palaeozoic age. 

 At the same time, it must not be overlooked that Corda described two 

 species of Carboniferous and Permian endogenous wood, while the 

 exhaustive studies of Prof. Williamson, extending over a great num- 

 ber of years, have brought to light the existence of some anomalous 

 woods and other plant-structures from the Coal-measures, in the most 

 perfect preservation, so that it is certainly within the bounds of possi- 

 bility that we may some day come to a clearer appreciation as to the 

 lines through which Angiosperms were differentiated from the older 

 Cryptogams or Gymnosperms. 



There are met with, however, in the Coal-measures, the exceed- 

 ingly problematical remains of a plant which is claimed in the 

 latest work of Saporta and Marion to be a " pro- Angiosperm," or, in 

 other words, an Angiosperm imperfectly differentiated from a Cryp- 

 togamic or Gymnospermic stock. The widely-distributed fossil, 

 known as Spirangium, consists of acutely-pointed spindle-shaped 

 bodies, which are believed to be composed of from five to ten linear 

 valves, supposed to envelope a central cavity. These valves usually 

 appear to be spirally twisted, but in some specimens, which seem to 



DECADE III. VOL. III. NO. V. 13 



