422 Solms-Laubach. — On the Fructification 
bases, and that of the fructifications squeezed in between the 
bases of the leaves, in so masterly a manner from his numer- 
ous preparations, that at present I have chiefly only to 
confirm his results, though, as might be expected, a fresh 
examination may be found to throw further light on some 
questions of detail. 
Carruthers’ investigations embraced a large number of stems 
which had been discovered in the course of time chiefly in the 
south of England, and their result was to show that in all 
cases alike there were certain anatomical characters which in- 
dicate an essential difference from recent Cycadeae. The leaf- 
trace was found in every case to be formed of a single strand, 
which, separating by repeated division into numerous branches 
before it issues from the leaf, runs perpendicularly downwards 
through the cortex to enter the ring of wood ; in its lower 
portion it contributes largely for a certain distance to the 
secondary growth of the wood. There is no sign of the 
arching of the leaf-traces to form a girdle, such as we see 
in our living forms, and on this point I may venture to 
speak quite decidedly after repeated and most careful exami- 
nation of many specimens. The somewhat feebly developed 
hollow cylinder of the secondary growth separates normally 
into a ring of bast and a ring of wood ; it is divided by rather 
broad intervals, filled with parenchyma, into segments of 
unequal size. The tangential section which Carruthers had 
before him only in the case of his Bennettites saxbyanus , and 
which I find to have exactly the same structure in one of the 
Italian stems, shows a broadish rhomboid gap in the wood 
and bast over each of the emerging strands. It is these 
gaps filled with parenchyma, which cause the interruptions in 
the woody ring on the transverse section. The entire cylinder 
of wood and bast thus becomes a trellis-work, with spindle- 
shaped meshes, and consequently presents a very striking 
though superficial resemblance to the vascular bundle-system 
of the stems of Ferns, as Carruthers himself says on page 696 : 
5 The analogy between these fossil stems and the caudex of a 
tree-fern is very remarkable.’ Closer examination will doubt- 
