71 
form in so far as it can be surmised in the absence of the distal margins and 
tips. It is obviously unwise to attempt to characterize this species, which 
is quite probably new, and I have contented myself with presenting a 
composite drawing of the features preserved, made from two or three of 
the more complete specimens, and on this drawing I have suggested the 
possible complete outline, based on complete material of what appears to 
have been similar species. 
A great many fossil species of Platanus ranging in age from the Mid- 
Cretaceous to the Pleistocene, have been described. The genus appears 
rather suddenly in the continental and littoral deposits of the initial trans- 
gression of the Upper Cretaceous sea in both this country and Europe. 
Thus there are at least 11 good species in the Dakota sandstone and 5 
additional equivalents in the Atlantic Coastal Plain and Greenland, and 
there are a larger number of contemporaneous European forms. 
With the prevalence of predominately marine sedimentation in the 
post-Dakota Upper Cretaceous there is a great shrinkage, not only in the 
representation of Platanus, but of all terrestrial plants. In this country 
there is only one Platanus in the Eagle sandstone, another in the Vermejo 
formation of Colorado, another in the Laramie, and two in the Ripley 
formation of the Atlantic Coastal Plain. 
In Knowlton’s account of the fossil plants of the Boseman coal field 
in Montana, usually referred to the Montana group, the two species 
Platanus guillelmae Goeppert and Platanus aceroides Goeppert are recorded 1 , 
but neither is described or figured. The material was not complete and 
the two may represent a single botanical species, doubtless distinct from 
the European late Tertiary form with which it was identified. 
In the lignitic deposits near the boundary between the Upper Cre- 
taceous and the Eocene, which are usually considered by palseo botanists 
as of basal Eocene age, Platanus again becomes exceedingly abundant in 
the record with upwards of a score of described species not only in the 
United States and Canada but also in Greenland and Alaska. 
After comparing the Platanus from the Allison formation with all of 
the fossil species of that genus known to me it appears to be most similar 
to Platanus latior (Lesquereux) Knowlton, a Dakota-Tuscaloosa species, 
and to various forms that have been identified with the European Platanus 
aceroides Goeppert. I am inclined to think that it is a new species, and 
probably identical with that referred to above from the Livingston forma- 
tion of Montana. Dawson 2 referred incidentally to a Platanus like Platanus 
nobilis Newberry in the Belly River beds at Medicine Hat. This is quite 
likely to be the same as the Allison formation species, if any reliance can 
be placed on Dawson’s comparison, since fragments of the former would 
greatly resemble the latter. 
Viburnum sp. 
Leaves of variable but relatively large size, in which the tip and 
margins are wanting. Outline ovate, widest below middle. Apex nar- 
rowed and presumably acute. Base decurrent. Tertiaries are percurrent. 
1 Knowlton, F. H.: Bull. TJ.S Geol. Surv,, No. 105, p. 53 (1893). 
* Dawson, J. W.: Trans. Boy. Soc., Canada, vol. 3, see. 4, p. 16 (1885). 
