XXXni] CORDAITES 221 



is now available enables us to reconstruct the complete plant 

 witli a greater degree of confidence than is usually attainable. 

 Cordaites may be described as a forest-tree closely resembling 

 in habit and probably in size the recent Conifer Agathis, more 

 especially such species as A. macrofhyllus, A. vitiensis and others 

 with leaves considerably longer than those of the Kauri Pine 

 (A. australisY The main stem reached a considerable height 

 before giving off scattered branches bearing spirally disposed, 

 sessile, and often crowded leaves^ like the foliage of Agathis. The 

 absence of any evidence of a two-ranked arrangement of leaves 

 on lateral branches suggests a general tendency towards a vertical 

 rather than a horizontal direction of growth. The sessile and 

 closely set leaves for the most part of leathery texture vary 

 considerably in length and breadth in different types (figs. 466 — 

 472) : in some the broadly hnear lamina with its parallel veins 

 and perfectly constructed I-shaped girders (fig. 465) reached 

 a length of nearly 100 cm., in shape like the blade of a straight 

 broad-sword or the leaves of a Yucca, torn by the wind into 

 strips ; in other forms the lamina is shorter and more obovate, 

 while in some the leafy shoots must have looked like slender 

 stems of the smaller-leaved Bamboos. There is no proof that 

 young vegetative branches with their spirally rolled leaves' were 

 protected by bud-scales, but some oval triangular scales (fig. 468, C), 

 occasionally found in association with larger foliage-leaves, may 

 have served that purpose. The branches from which leaves had 

 recently fallen at the time of fossilisation are characterised by 

 transversely elongated oval scars, occasionally showing a shghtly 

 curved row of pits like the marks of leaf- traces on the scars of 

 a Horse Chestnut, sometimes terminating a feebly projecting 

 decurrent leaf-cushion (fig. 466, C). The leaves persisted for a 

 comparatively long period as in Araucaria imbricata, and on 

 older leafless branches the scars are transversely stretched; 

 the leaf-cushion loses its individuality and eventually the develop- 



1 See Vol. IV. 



2 For restorations, see Grand'Eury (77) A. PI. D; good examples of foliage- 

 shoots are figured by Renault and Zeiller (88) A. Pis. Lxvi. Lxxxi. ; Grand'Eury 

 (90) A. PI. LXiv. ; Kidston (02) B. PI. LXiv. fig. 2. 



" Renault (79) B. PI. xvi. fig. 1; Lignier (13^). Cf. Dolerophyllum, p. 133. 



