CYCADOFILICES 499 



A distant resemblance to the structure of Sutcliffia may 

 be traced, but we must await the results of further 

 investigation before forming any opinion as to the true 

 relationships of the fossil. 



The question of the relation of the families still 

 provisionally grouped under Cycadofilices to the Seed- 

 plants on the one hand and to the Ferns on the other, 

 must necessarily remain an open one so long as any 

 satisfactory evidence as to the fructification is absent. 

 In the case of the Calamopityeae and Cycadoxyleae 

 the high anatomical organisation affords a presumption 

 that we here have to do with Pteridospermeae, even if 

 not with more advanced Spermophyta ; the analogy 

 between the structure of Megaloxylon and that of 

 Heterangium among the Lyginodendreae points, though 

 much less decidedly, in the same direction. The 

 Protopityeae and Cladoxyleae, however, appear too 

 isolated, at present, for us even to venture on any 

 conjecture as to their affinities, beyond what is implied 

 in classing them as " Cycadofilices." 



33 



