CORYLUS AVELLANA Linn. 



PL IV, figs. 34, 35. 



We have seen no perfect specimens, but broken nuts of Corylus avellana are 

 found at Reuver, Swalmen, and Brunssum. They correspond in shape with this species, 

 and not with any of the other living forms; but our fossils are always strongly striate 

 longitudinally. This character is not usually seen on recent nuts, unless the outer layers 

 have decayed; but we find in the Kew Herbarium a recent specimen showing this 

 striation. Perhaps our fossils should be referred to Corylus avellanoides Engelh.* of the 

 brown coal of Saxony, which is figured as resembling C. avellana but is more striate. 



BETULA. 



Remains of Betula are rare, though three species occur, and these belong to two 

 different sections of the genus. The discovery of a species clearly belonging to the 

 section Eubetula is of considerable interest, for at the present day this section is confined to 

 Asia, and as far as we can learn none of the previously known fossil species belong to it. 



BETULA DIGITATA Sp. nov. 

 PI. IV, figs. 37a, b, 38. 



Bractea fructifera dura, lignosa, ad medium trifida, nervis tribus e basi 

 CUNEATA valde conspicuis, lob'o mediano anguste spatulato, lobis lateralibus parum 

 divergentibus et tunc extra curvatis, sinu rotundato. 



Fruiting bract hard woody, trifid to half its length, strongly 3*veined from the 

 cuneate base, middle lobe narrow spatulate, lateral lobes slightly divergent and then 

 curved outward (incomplete at tips), sinus rounded. 



Length 6 mm. Swalmen. 



Seed hard, broadly rhomboidal truncate at base acute above, shouldered on either 

 side of the styles, little if at all winged. 



Length 3.2 mm. Swalmen. 



The bract is remarkable as belonging to the section Eubetula subsection Costatae, 

 and comes very near to Betula ulmifolia, (figs. 36a, b.) with which we have photographed 

 it. In the new species however the bract is shorter, more spatulate, its side lobes are 

 given off at a more acute angle, and in the grooves on the ventral side it is hairy. The 

 seed is wider than in B. ulmifolia (fig. 39), tends to be cuspidate on either side of the 

 apex, and appears to have been almost without wings. 



We have compared the fossil bract with that of all the species of the section, 

 except four which do not happen to be in the Kew Herbarium; it does not agree with 

 any of them, nor with the published descriptions of the other four. Whether the seed 

 should be referred to the same species we are uncertain; it has considerable resemblance 



Engelhardt, Die Flora der Braunkohlenformation in Sachsen, fol. 1870, p. 36, pi. X.figs. 7, 8. 



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