539 
Female Strobilus in Podocarpus. 
(Fig. 2i ,/. br.) and a great many with 3-5 (Figs. T9 and 21). In every case 
the axis was terminated by a bud pushed on one side by the growth of the 
last fertile bract (Fig. 20, ap. bud). In no case, and a great deal of material 
was available, were the bud-scales and modified leaves of the axis and the 
apical bud absent. 
In Fig. 2i, where only one ovule was present, a cicatrized scar showed 
where the apical bud had been broken, or more probably eaten off. This 
fact had possibly caused the modified lower leaves to develop laminae and 
so grow out as ordinary foliage leaves. 
In the o 71 shoots, as stated by Pilger, the same conditions obtain. 
Ten to thirty flowers are massed on an axis about 5 cm. long, where they 
may arise in the axils of small bracts only, or the shoot axis may bear 
foliage leaves at the base, which gradually pass into the bracts, the lowest 
flowers being borne in the axils of the foliage leaves, and an apical bud may 
develop ( 40 , p. 10). 
The $ ‘spike’ of P. spicata may be regarded as an entire strobilus, 
and fossil evidence may be referred to in support of this interpretation. 
Nathorst ( 62 ) describes in S tacky otaxus septentrionalis , C. A. Agardh, and 
Stachyotaxus elegans , Nath., an almost identical structure. He figures the 
strobilus of the former ( 62 , Figs. 1 and 2, t. 2) and the resemblance is very 
striking; these figures show scale leaves densely clothing the peduncle, 
which are succeeded by a number of bracts, all of which are fertile, inserted 
at regular intervals on the axis. Nathorst refers to the similarity in structure 
of the $ shoot of this plant (which he rightly holds to be a Dacrydium) 
with P, spicata ( 62 , p. 15). The £ strobili of Stachyotaxus show the 
elongation of the axis with the spacing of the sporophylls which is so 
striking in the $ strobilus in this genus. Nathorst figures these £ strobili 
with reserve, as they have not been found in organic connexion with 
Stachyotaxus , but they are so typically Dacrydioid that there can be little 
doubt that they belong to the same plant. 
In § Stachycarpus the lamina of the fertile bract remains free from 
the ovuliferous scale, and does not keep pace with its growth, as described 
and figured in P. vitiensis (Fig. 27). The region of the ovuliferous scale 
referred to in the description of P . vitiensis as the semicircular ridge is 
in § Stachycarpus more prominently developed, and appears as a conical 
apex projecting from the free side of the ovuliferous scale above the place 
of insertion of the ovule. Pilger describes this pointed apex as a 
narrowing of the ‘epimatium’ into a blunt continuation (‘stumpfen Fortsatz’), 
but as this continuation is furnished with two well-developed vascular strands 
with resin canals (Fig. 22, v. b. o. s.), and the foliar structure of the scale in the 
shape of epidermis, stomata, and stone cells is equally and continuously 
distributed, it seems to indicate that it is an integral portion of the scale 
itself. The greater development of this region may be related to the water 
