FILICITES OSMUNDiE. 

 OSMUND FILICITE. 



Generic Character. 

 Leaf, or, frond, forming a flat surface, the two sides of which are symmetric ; 

 secondary rib simple or forked. 



Specific Character. 



FILICITES osmundce. Leaflets broad/ rather falcate; rib single, branched, 

 branches divergent, forked. 



Synonyms. 

 This fossil plant has not as yet been found described, or figured in any work. 



Description and Locality. 



Stipes (wanting in the specimen) bipinnate. 



Pinna six-paired? with an odd one; lower leaflets opposite, upper leaflets 

 alternate. 



Leaflets lanceolate, one-eared at the base, tip turned to one side; rib single 

 branched ; branches divergent, forked as shewn in fig. 3. 



Found in shale in El-se-car new colliery ; but for the sake of exhibiting the plant 

 in the most perfect manner, the matrix has not been figured. The leaflets are often 

 found detached, and in many instances they are so little altered, and so slightly attached 

 to their matrix, that they may be separated by laying hold of them with a small pair 

 of forceps, or by cementing them to paper by means of isinglass. When separated, 

 they leave an impression in the shale, as is represented at 2, in respect to the three 

 lower pairs of leaflets, which have been raised by the last mentioned means. 



Detached leaflets of this filicite are often found in nodules of ironstone. 



Observations. 



Count Sternberg has figured a fossil plant of this kind from the coal mines of 

 Schaltzlar ; but the shape of the leaf, which is neither eared at the base, nor subfalcate 

 at the tip, shows that it is not of the same species. 



He has figured another communicated to hiin by Professor Buckland, and found 

 in the coal mines at Radstock near Bath, which appears to come nearer to the pre- 

 sent specimen, but still there is such a difference in the shape of the leaflets as to 

 justify their being considered, at least for the present, as of different species. 



