L. F. Ward — Fossil Cycads in the Ycde Museum. 339 



horizontal in the middle part of the trunk, declined near the 

 base and progressively ascending above to the erect terminal 

 leaves; phyllotaxy faintly traceable over some small areas near 

 the base, indicating that the spiral rows from left to right 

 make an angle of about 50°, and those from right to left one 

 of about 60°, with the axis ; leaf scars subrhombic, the vertical 

 angles rounded, the upper often reduced to a curve, only those 

 near the base normal or distinct, the rest much reduced and 

 distorted, crowded and massed together so as to present a 

 peculiar wrinkled and gnarly appearance, small and very nar- 

 row in proportion to their width, normal ones 2 cm wide, l cm 

 high; leaf bases always present, of an open structure, with 

 deep, variously-shaped pores separated by thin partitions, some 

 projecting, others depressed, often showing the leaf bundles, 

 which are arranged in a row all the way round some distance 

 from the margin, thus appearing near the center always as 

 large distinct pits; w T alls 2-5 mm thick, white, flinty and fine 

 grained, much grooved and divided longitudinally, those of 

 the central and upper parts of the trunk consisting of two 

 smooth plates separated by a deep furrow, rising above and 

 surrounding the small leaf bases so as to enclose them and form 

 numerous shallow cups or short tubes, the whole giving to the 

 surface a peculiar wrinkled appearance; reproductive organs 

 common but some distance apart and not the cause of the gen- 

 eral distortion, normal and fairly well developed, rising a little 

 above the surface, variable in size, some having a diameter of 

 25x4rO mm , others only of 15x25 mm , surrounded by very numer- 

 ous subrhombic involucral bract scars resembling and gradually 

 passing into the leaf scars, the central portion showing mark- 

 ings that represent the essential organs; armor about 25 mm 

 thick, somewhat definitely joined to the axis; woody zone 

 3-4 cm thick, the parts incapable of being distinguished or 

 described, but consisting in large part of loose open structure; 

 medulla 6xlO cm in diameter, black within, hard and fine 

 grained. 



This species is represented by the single specimen, No. 727, 

 purchased by Mr. Wells from a dealer in Hot Springs, who 

 stated that it was obtained from some unknown person who 

 claimed to have found it " 50 miles west of Hot Springs in 

 Wyoming." If the direction were due west, this point would 

 fall in lungitude 104° 30' west from Greenwich and 12 miles 

 west of the line of the Cretaceous border on the maps of the 

 Black Hills. As the foot hills end about 20 miles west of Hot 

 Springs and are succeeded here as in all parts of the Hills by 

 the Upper Cretaceous, and these again by higher deposits, one 

 would naturally suppose that this locality would fall far out on 

 the Tertiary terrane. It therefore seems more probable that 



