48 



BRITISH EOCENE ELORA. 



drupaceous fruit, comprising according to Gordon, eight species which inhabit from New 

 Caledonia to Japan, one being the only Conifer indigenous to Hindustan. Eupodocarpiis, 

 in which the leaves are linear, with one nerve, and the fruit solitary, with a fleshy 

 receptacle, comprising forty-six species according to Gordon. Stachj carpus, with linear 

 single-nerved leaves, alternate or in two rows, and fruits born on spikes without the 

 fleshy receptacle, possessing but two species. Bacrycarpus, with squaraiforra spiral 

 leaves on the fertile branches, flat and distichous leaves on the barren, and fruit similar 

 to, but smaller than in Eupodocarpus, comprising four species. 



The Podocarps vary from mere shrubs to colossal trees, and are widely spread over 

 the Southern Hemisphere. They are well represented in the Oriental, Ethiopian, 

 Australian, Neotropical, Pala^arctic, and China — Japan provinces ; and in the Nearctic 

 province by a single Californian species. 



Notwithstanding this almost world-wide distribution, and the evidence of antiquity 

 which the genus presents, scarcely anything is known of their past history. In most 

 cases the foliage when detached has little to distinguish it from that of better known 



Coniferse, and the fruits, in the fossil condition, seldom 

 present anything by which their Gymnospermous nature 

 can be detected. Except a doubtful and undescribed 

 species from Aix-la-Chapelle, no Podocarp is known of 

 earlier age than Eocene, when they at once appear with a 

 wide distribution over temperate Europe, again as sud- 

 denly disappearing with the Ohgocene. No Podocarp has 

 been made known from either the Arctic or the American Cretaceous or Tertiary series, 

 and therefore, either the distribution of existing species must have been accomplished 

 prior to the Cretaceous period, or, in order to explain their presence in Chili and other 

 parts of South America, we are forced to admit a land connection far to the south of that 

 relied upon by Wallace and those who share his opinions. 



The fossil Podocarps that are only known from their foliage may be conveniently 

 classified under two heads, those that have shed their leaves separately, and those in 

 which they remain adhering to branchlets. Both sections are represented in our British 

 Eocenes. 



Fig. 21.— Fruit of 

 Podocarpus elata. 



Fig. 22.— Apex 

 of the same. 



Podocarpus eoc^nica, linger. Plate II, fig. 6 — 15. 



Unger. Fossile Flora von Sotzka, p. 28, pi. ii, figs. 11—16, 1850. 

 — Sylloge Plantarum Fossilium, pi. 31, pp. 10—12, 1860, &c. 



Middle Bagshot, Bournemouth ; Lower Bagshot, Alum Bay ; Upper Bagshot, Hord- 

 well ; Middle Eocene (?), Mull, and Antrim. 



