Text-fig. i. Traquairia Carruthersii. From Mr. Carruthers’s original diagram. 
This view has met with some acceptance. Dr. Hinde 1 says in one of 
his papers : ‘ The minute spherical bodies in the Coal Measures, known as 
Traquairia , have been shown by Professor Williamson to be vegetable 
structures.’ 
No new work has been done on this subject for a long time ; many 
botanists have come to the conclusion that the Traquairiae are not plant 
structures, and do not seem to think it part of their duty to investigate them. 
The zoologists, however, seem to take no interest in them either. During 
1 Dr. Hinde, Annals Nat. Hist., Ser. 6, vol. vi, p. 46. 
R. Scott. — On Traquairia . 
in 1880, in which some fine vigorous drawings of these objects are to be 
found. 
Professor Williamson suggested that Traquairia bore more resemblance 
to the spore of a Cryptogam, and concluded that it was a reproductive 
organ of some unidentified Cryptogamic plant. Professors Haeckel and 
Strasburger examined his specimens and agreed with him that they were 
vegetable and not animal structures. 
