Maryland G-eologioal Survey 443 



marginem superiorem libere pendula, tiiberculis minutishilo orbiculari 

 inserta, elliptica^ compressa, integumento subcrustaceo utrmkiie in 

 alam membranaceum rigidam, latmsculam, basi ad hilum emarginatam, 

 apice versus micropylen deorsum spectantem sensim angustatam pro- 

 ducto. Albumen carnosum. 



"Abores Calif ornicse, gigantege. Eami alterni, teretes, foliis abbre- 

 viatis anguste lanceolatis longe adnato decurrentibus vestiti; ramulorum 

 foliis linearibus, alternis distiche lineari-subfalcatis, obtusiusculis v. 

 acutis, rigide coriaceis, persistentibus, supra lucidis, sulco longitudinali 

 exaratis/ subtus nervo valido, et utrinque juxta nervum stomatum fasciis 

 albidis notatis. SemmEe terminales perulatse, perulis ad innovationes 

 persistentibus. Amenta staminigera in ramulis axillaribus brevissimis 

 solitaria, sgepe spicam foliatam referentia. Strobili in ramulis brevibus, 

 perulis imbricatis tectis ad innovationes solitarii, nueis Avellanse magni- 

 tudine, squamis in rhachi persistentibus." — Endlicher^ 1847. 



What appears to be the earliest authentic record of a Sequoia is fur- 

 nished by the cones found in the Portlandian of France.^ Eanging 

 through the succeeding Lower Cretaceous deposits about a dozen species 

 are known. The localities include Maryland, Virginia, California, 

 Montana, Wyoming, and Texas; and outside the United States, British 

 Columbia, Greenland, Mexico, Spitzbergen, Portugal, Belgium, Germany, 

 Switzerland, England, and Eussia. Wood of the Sequoia type of struc- 

 ture is also known from the Lower Cretaceous of this country and 

 Europe. In the Upper Cretaceous species of Sequoia become still more 

 abundant and they apparently extend their range and specific differen- 

 tiation throughout the greater portion of the succeeding Tertiary period ; 

 some of the forms, represented by foliage, cones and wood, being almost 

 identical with the modern red wood Sequoia sempervirens (Lamb.) 

 Endl., while others appear to be ancestral to the modern big tree of Cali- 

 fornia Sequoia w ashing toniana (Winsl.) Sudworth. The climatic 

 changes of the Pleistocene seem to have inaugurated the extinction of 

 this type which had previously become restricted in America by the 



^Fliche and Zeiller, Bull. Soc. geol. France (iv) tome iv, 1904, p. 798, pi. 

 xix, figs. 4, 5. 



