394 OLDER MESOZOIC FLORAS OF UNITED STATES. 
CYCADELLA BEECHERIANA Ward. 
Pl. LXXVII; Pl. LX XVIII. 
1900. Cycadella Beecheriana Ward: Proc. Wash. Acad. Sei., Vol. I, p. 265, pl. xvi. 
Trunk cylindrical, contracted at base and summit, somewhat later- 
ally compressed, unbranched, 35 cm. high, 18 by 22 cm. in diameter ; 
rock substance soft, generally light colored with darker stripes and 
spots strongly contrasting, of low specific gravity ; organs of the armor 
horizontal; phyllotaxy concealed by the outer coating of ramentum ; 
leaf scars subrhombic or somewhat elliptical, 15 to 20 mm. wide, 5 to 
10 mm. high; leaf bases dark colored, punctate; walls about 5 mm. 
thick, firm, white, sometimes with a median line; reproductive organs 
well developed, somewhat raised above the general surface, elliptical 
in cross section, 2 by 8 cm. in diameter, surrounded by subrhombic 
bract scars in several rows, the central portion heterogeneous and 
more or less crystallized; armor 3 to 4 cm. thick, joining the axis by 
an irregular line ; wood 8 to 4 cm. thick; cortical parenchyma 1 to 2 
em. thick; fibrous zone 2 cm. thick, not differentiated into rings, firm 
and dark colored; medulla mostly wanting in the only specimen 
known, the preserved remains flinty and white. 
Of this species there has thus far been found less than half of one 
trunk. The upper two-thirds of this consists of the fragment No. 
128 of the Yale collection. When I studied this fragment in Novem- 
ber, 1898, it was all in one piece, but subsequently broke into two 
nearly soul pieces by an oblique transverse fracture, and a small lump 
came out of the lower one of these pieces. While sending the larger 
collection at Washington in June, 1899, I felt the need of again seeing 
the two Yale specimens in order to correlate them with the rest, and 
at my request Dr. C. E. Beecher kindly sent them to me for the pur- 
pose. As soonas I saw this fragment I at once recognized its resem- 
blance to a smaller fragment of the Knight collection, No. 500.54, 
which I had been unable to class with any of the rest. On confront- 
ing them it was found that No. 500.54 of the Wyoming collection fitted 
perfectly on the lower end of No. 128 of the Yale collection, thus 
nearly completing it in that direction, but still leaving a small part of 
the base unrepresented. Thus restor ad the specimen represents nearly 
half of the original trunk, ‘which was split down quite evenly from 
sumnit.to base on a lonsibadinal plane a trifle on one side of the center. 
On the fractured surface thus presented the internal characters are 
exposed with great clearness. 
As a partial recognition of the interest taken by Dr. Beecher in the 
subject of cycads in general and in the Wyoming specimens in partic- 
ular, I dedicate this species to him. 
