CYCADOPHYTA 60 1 



interseminal scale are greatly reduced sporophylls 

 analogous to and derived from sporophylls like those 

 of the existing Cycads." l Arber and Parkin, who 

 likewise regard the whole fructification as a flower, 

 or " anthostrobilus," to use their own term, 2 consider 

 that the interseminal scales are " homologous with the 

 carpels of the Angiosperms, despite the fact that they 

 subtend and do not bear the seed-pedicels." 3 They 

 point out " a possibility that the seed-pedicels may, 

 in part, represent a lobe of the carpellary leaf," 4 and 

 that they may or may not be homologous with the 

 funicle of Angiospermous seeds. Professor Lignier 

 argues with considerable force against the suggestion 

 that seed-pedicels and interseminal scales represent 

 lobes of the carpellary leaves, pointing out the complete 

 independence of the bundles supplying the two organs, 

 the absence of any definite relation in their arrange- 

 ment, the differences in their structure, and especially 

 the fact that in Bennettites Morierei the outer inter- 

 seminal scales have several vascular bundles and are 

 flattened like the bracts. 6 It seems better to take 

 the view that the interseminal scales are, like the bracts, 

 modified leaves, though much more reduced, while we 

 regard the seed-pedicels as the reduced megasporophylls 

 or carpels. The interseminal scales may be sterile 



1 L.c. p. 231. 



3 They apply the term "pro-anthostrobilus," to the Bennettitean flower, 

 to indicate its primitive features. 



3 Origin of Angiosperms, p. 59. 



4 L.c. p. 66. 5 L.c. p. 65. 



6 O. Lignier, Le fruit des Bennettitdes, 1908, p. 7 ; " Notes complement- 

 aires sur la structure du Bennettites Morierei," Bull, dc la Soc. Linn, de 

 Normandic, ser. v. vol. xiii. 1904. I have occasionally observed inter- 

 seminal scales with two bundles in Bennettites Gibsonianus. 



