42 L. F. Ward — Famous Fossil Cycad. 



block of petrifactions which M. Borlach, Counsellor of Mines, 

 sent ns from Poland. It weighs over 100 pounds, and is, in 

 our opinion, only a mass of petrified Hippurites, or coral-cups, 

 although a celebrated naturalist entertains the view that this 

 superb mass may be the summit of a palm tree turned to 

 stone." (P. 23 of the French and p. 24 of the German). 



Dr. Deichmiiller also found in the library of the Dresden 

 Museum the original manuscript catalogue in Eilenburg's hand- 

 writing and never published, bearing the title : " Lithoxylorum 

 sen lignorum petrefactorum varii generis variseque specie! 

 Catalogus Novus in quo simul osteocollarum et lignorum fos- 

 silium prsesens collectio indicata est a Christiano Henrico 

 Eilenburgio, MDCCLIII." On page 41 of this catalogue 

 occurs the following entry written in Latin : " No. 76. A seg- 

 ment certainly of petrified palm wood, the fibers and stems so 

 distinct that they would be taken for combustible wood unless 

 the contrary is shown by handling and weighing. A certain 

 projecting knot surrounded by regularly arranged natural rows 

 and fibers calls for special attention in this remarkable petrifac- 

 tion ; but the structure is the same above and below and such 

 that we are able to see that it penetrates through the entire 

 thickness of the trunk. From Poland." 



The specimen was first figured by George Wolfgang Knorr 

 in his well-known " Sammlung von Merkwiirdigkeiten der Natur 

 und Alterthlimern des Erdbodens oder versteinte und andere 

 gegrabene Corner in illuminirten Kupfertafeln," of the text for 

 which he only lived to write the first fascicle of 36 folio pages 

 (JSurnberg, 1755). This did not include the description of this 

 specimen. The remainder of the text was written by Johann 

 Ernst Immanuel Walch, and published as a separate work 

 with the title : Die Naturgeschichte der Versteinerungen zur 

 Erlauterung der Knorrischen Sammlung von Merkwiirdigkeiten 

 der Eatur, Eurnberg, Erster Theil, 1773, Zweyter Theil, Erster 

 Abschnitt, 1768, Zweyter Abschnitt, 1769, Dritter Theil, 1771, 

 Yierter Theil, 1773. This work is usually preceded by Knorr's 

 fascicle and accompanied by the atlas as a separate volume, the 

 whole being known as the work of Knorr and Walch. The 

 plates of the atlas are numbered in an almost incomprehensible 

 manner, but the figure occurs on Plate Ilia of the Supple- 

 ment, which is really the 220th plate of the work, of which it 

 is figure 6. No one who has seen the specimen would ever 

 recognize this as being a figure of it, as it does not show either 

 the shape or the markings at all correctly. 



In Walch's description of it, which occurs on pages 150-152 

 of the third part, nothing is said of the defects of Knorr' s 

 figure, and he confines himself to a general treatment of the 

 specimen. He quotes extensively from what he calls "Rath 



