A REMARKABLE FOSSIL TREE TRUNK 339 



of leaf cushion characters and arrangement, by the form and 

 details of its leaf scars, and by its persistent small leaves which 

 are more or less distinctly conical at their bases. Comparison 

 of.the fossil with other and less imposing fragments of Devonic 

 Lycopods shows it to be one of the more highly developed 

 representatives of a fairly distinct archaic group foreshadowing 

 the later genera Bothrodendron (Cyclostigma), Sigillaria, Lepi- 

 dodendron, and Lepidophloios. Among the members of this 

 ancient group is the plant from the Devonic of New York 

 figured by Vanuxem^, and later named^ Sigillaria van- 

 u X e m i by Goppert in his great work on the Flora of the 

 Transition Series. The present repository of Vanuxem's type 

 specimen is not known to me and I have therefore not been 

 able to consult it. However, the collection of the State Geolog- 

 ical Survey contains a similar specimen combining the lepi- 

 dodendroid and sigillarioid forms of leaf cushion and probably 

 belonging to the same species. To the Vanuxem plant, with 

 which the Naples tree is certainly congeneric, Mr Kidston,^ the 

 distinguished British student of Paleozoic plants, has given the 

 special generic name Archaeosigillaria. 



After the examination of the greater part of the lepidophytic 

 material from the North American Devonic I am convinced that 

 by far the greater number of the forms described as Lepidoden- 

 dron from the Middle and Upper Devonic of this continent are 

 referable to the genus Archaeosigillaria. It should be noted, 

 however, that the name applied by Professor Kidston is pos- 

 sibly preoccupied by Protol-epidodendron, earlier proposed by 

 Krejci.* The generic relation of Protolepidodendron 

 scharianum, the type of the genus, to Archaeosigillaria 

 is at present uncertain since Krejci did not illustrate his speci- 

 mens, and the later publications by Stur"\ and by Bernard and 

 Potonie* leave doubt as to whether Krejci's original specimen 

 is not characterized by bifurcation of the leaves. The question 

 of the generic nomenclature will be discussed more fully in 

 a later paper treating in a somewhat detailed form many of 

 the lepidophytic types from the Devonic of the eastern United 

 States. 



iQeoL N. Y. 3d Dist. 1842. p. 184, fig. 51. 



^Foss. Fl. d. Uebergangsgebirge. 1851. p. 200. 



^Nat. Hist. Soc. Trans. Glasgow. 1901. n.s. v. 6, pt i, p. 38. 



■*Sitzb. k. bohrn, Gesell. Wiss. 1879. p. 203. 



SSitzb. k. Akad. Wiss., Wien, Math. Nat. 01. 1881. v. Ixxxiv, Abth. i, p. 333. 



*F1. Dev. Etage H de Barrande. 1905. p. 40. 



