90 



BRITISH EOCENE FLORA. 



The short and obtusely pointed undeveloped leaflets, and the obtuse angles formed by 

 those which are expanded, and their blunted apices, serve to distinguish it from other 

 British species, and especially from that described as Sequoia Langsdorjii from Mull. 

 These characters agree much more closely with those of the Yew than with any other 

 Conifer, and particularly with some forms of Taxus cicspidata of Japan in the Kew 

 Herbarium, and T. baccafa Maderensis of the Canaries. T. cuspidata is a hardy species 

 found on the Island of Jezo, and the Madeira Yew is almost extinct. 



I have named the fossil in compliment to my friend Mr. William Swanston, E.G.S., 

 and Hon. Secretary of the Belfast Naturalists' Eield Club, to whom I am indebted for 

 much kindness and assistance. 



Some of the Arctic specimens determined as Sequoia Langsdorfii, Taxites validus, 

 and T. Olriki, greatly resemble it, and an actual comparison may prove their identity. 



Athrotaxis CouTTsiJi, Heer, sp. (See page 36.) Plate VI, figs. 1 — 9 ; Plate X, figs. 



6—9. 



Sequoia Couttsi^, Heer (pars: Hempstead). Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc, vol. xviii, p. 



369, pi. xviii, 1862. 



The cones are woody, globular, about thirteen miUimetres in diameter, persistent after 

 shedding seed, and composed of about twenty-four imbricated scales, arranged spirally on 

 a very short axis. The scales are persistent, wedge-shape, contracted and stipitate at 

 base, thickened at the apex ; the heads are lozenge-shaped to pentagonal, wider, seven 

 millimetres, than high, five millimetres, convex exteriorly, much hollowed interiorly to 

 receive the seeds, with a more or less lozenge-shaped scar in centre. The scales become 

 much smaller towards the base. Seeds of the same species are figured by Heer from 

 Hempstead, and are small, curved, and winged laterally. The leaves are very small, 

 thick in texture, closely adpressed to the branches, imbricated, spirally arranged, ovate, 

 pointed, sometimes falcate, obscurely keeled on the back, concave on the face, entirely 

 adherent at the base. 



The discovery late last autumn of very perfect and uncompressed specimens of this 

 Conifer at Hordwell revealed the fact that the scales of the cone are overlapping or 

 imbricate as in Athrotaxis, and not at right angles to the axis as in Sequoia. In 

 describing Sequoia Couttsia in the present work {ante, p. 38) I felt the unsatisfactory 

 nature of the determination, remarking that the remains existing did " not conclusively 

 establish the accuracy of its reference to Sequoia," and that the evidently swampy station 

 it flourished in was at variance with the habits of either existing species. The leaves also 

 are far more slender and delicate than those of the existing S. gigantea, and do not 

 suggest that they could have belonged to a tree of robust habit and colossal size. I have 

 no hesitation whatever in uniting the Hempstead specimens with this species, but those 

 from Bovey-Tracey described by Heer have disappeared, and the figures give no 



