262 ABATJCAEnsrEAE [CH. 



leaves with Araucaria Bidwilli and A. imbricata ; but the mafority 

 of these shoots are referred to such genera as Voltzia, Walchia, 

 Albertia, and Ullmannia. It is pointed out in the description of 

 these genera that there are reasons for beheving them to have 

 Araucarian affinities, though there is no definite evidence that any 

 of them bore cones exhibiting the same order of resemblance to 

 those of recent Araucarineae as is the case with Jurassic and 

 Cretaceous types. 



Araucarites Delafondi Zeiller. 



One of the very few Palaeozoic species of seed-bearing scales 

 that can reasonably be referred to the genus Araucarites is 

 A. Delafondi founded by Zeiller^ on some detached scales from 

 Permian beds at Charmoy; the scales are broadly triangular 

 10 — 12 mm. long and 8 — 10 mm. broad, the base is cuneate and 

 truncate, the apical margin is rounded and has a small median 

 depression instead of the usual spine. In the middle of the scale 

 is a shallow depression which contained a single seed 8 — 10 mm. 

 long and 2 mm. broad. As Zeiller says, there is no absolute 

 certainty as to the affinity of this species but the scales are un- 

 questionably very similar to those of Mesozoic and recent species 

 of Araucarites and Araucaria. It is suggested that the vegetative 

 shoots of Ullmannia frumentaria (fig. 750) from the same beds may 

 belong to the plant which bore cones with scales of A. Delafondi. 



The occurrence of widely distributed Jurassic cone-scales, 

 bearing a single seed and agreeing very closely in their shape and 

 size, as also in the laterally expanded borders and in many cases 

 in the presence of a distal spinous process, with those of recent 

 species of Araucaria especially those belonging to the section 

 Eutacta, bears striking testimony to the former extended geo- 

 graphical distribution of Araucarian plants. It has been pointed 

 out in a previous chapter that a single seed occasionally occurs on 

 the seminiferous scales of recent Pine cones (fig. 686, B), but in the 

 scales now under consideration the occurrence of a single seed is 

 a constant feature and moreover the form of the scales is identical 

 with that of such species as Araucaria excelsa and A. Cookii. The 

 number of names given to the fossil scales is but a rough index of 



1 ZeUler (06) B. p. 215, PI. L. fig. 1. 



