II. Bassler — Cycadophyte from the Coal Measures. 21 



Art. III. — A Cycadophyte from the North American Coal 

 Measures,- by Harvey Bassler. 



Although the remains of fronds of indubitable cycadophytes 

 have long been known from the European Paleozoic none have 

 heretofore been known from the North American Paleozoic. 



During the summer of 1915 the writer, while collecting from 

 the so-called Four-foot Coal Seam opposite Barnum, W. Va., 

 discovered a single characteristic specimen of the genus 

 Plagiozamites. 



The importance attached to the finding of this genus in the 

 Paleozoic of North America and the possible significance of 

 the occurrence of such a well-known Permian type as low in 

 the coal-measures as the middle of the Conemaugh forma- 

 tion warrants the publication of the present announcement in 

 advance of the publication of the detailed account of the flora 

 which is now approaching completion. 



The genus Plagiozamites was established in 1894 by Prof. 

 Rene Zeiller* to include cycadean fronds with oval-lanceolate 

 leaflets resembling in their general form those of Zcmiites, but 

 inserted obliquely on the common rachis, the leaflets differing, 

 further, from those of Zamites in that they do not display at 

 the base the callous thickening that always or nearly always 

 characterizes the latter. The Maryland specimen is not, how- 

 ever, specifically different from Plagiozamites Planchardi 

 (Renault) Zeillerf of the Lower Permian of Trienbach in 

 Alsace, and this makes the discovery of peculiar interest, for 

 the American material comes from a horizon in the Middle 

 Conemaugh 410'± below the Pittsburg seam of coal, which 

 marks the base of the superjacent Monongahela Formation, 

 and nearly 700' beneath what has been considered to be the 

 base of the Permian in this region. This fact, however, is in 

 perfect accord with other evidence tending to show an interest- 

 ing relationship between the middle Conemaugh of the Ap- 

 palachian province and the Permian of other regions. 



The appearance in the Conemaugh for the first time since 

 the close of the Mississippian of inherently red sediments has 

 for some years:}: been considered significant of some important 

 geologic change such as might mark the passage from the true 

 Coal Measures to the Permo-Carboniferous and this found con- 

 firmation in 1908 when in the Annals of the Carnegie Museum, 

 vol. iv, pages 234-241, Prof. E. C. Case described a small col- 

 lection of vertebrate fossils made by Dr. Percy E. Raymond in 



*Zeiller, 1894, Bull. Soc. Geol. France, 3e Serie, xxii, pp. 174, 177. 



+ Zeiller, 1894, ibid., p. 174, pi. viii, figs. 1-5, pi. ix, fig. 1. 



% White, I. C, 1903, West Virginia Geol. Survey, vol. ii, pp. 165, 226, 227. 



