The “ Origin of Gymnosperms ” 141 
who readily responded to the invitation of the Board and contributed 
two of the most valuable courses. 
The Board will in future arrange sets of courses from Session 
to Session. 
The lecturers for 1906—7 will be as follows:— 
Mr. Francis Darwin, F.R.S. “The Irritability of Plants.” 
Mr. A. G. Tansley. “The Evolution of the Vascular System 
in the Fern-Phylum.” 
Miss Ethel Sargant. “The Origin of Angiosperms.” 
THE ORIGIN OF GYMNOSPERMS AT THE 
LINNEAN SOCIETY. 
fllHE adjourned discussion on this subject (see New Phytologist, 
Vol. V., p. 68) was resumed at the Meeting on May 3rd. The 
President first called on Dr. Scott, the last of the four “openers,” 
to address the Meeting. 
Dr. Scott, rising at 8.15, said he would first like to make 
8.15 clear exactly what had been in the minds of those who had taken 
the view that the Cycads and probably the other Gymnosperms 
arose from a fern-like ancestry. In some quarters, though not 
among the previous speakers, the idea had gained ground that the 
view in question supposed the Cycads and their allies to have 
originated from some group represented among living ferns. But in 
1895 he had suggested that Lyginodendron and Hcterangium were 
derived from an ancestor belonging to a generalised or rather non- 
specialised fern-stock, and a few years later he had put forward the 
view that the common ancestors of Cycads and Cycadofilices were 
to be sought among simple ferns or fern-like plants. At no time had 
it been held that the Cycadofilices (or Pteridosperms) sprang from 
any family now known, still less from any recent family of ferns. 
As regarded the evidence for the origin of these groups there had 
been singularly little advance during the last few years. The whole 
raison d'etre of this discussion lay of course in the recent discovery 
of seeds borne upon fern-like plants. Before these discoveries the 
only evidence available was that of the vegetative organs and 
particularly of their anatomy, which had led to the conclusions 
indicated. Then, about three years ago, had come the discovery 
that one of these fern-like plants bore seeds, and that was quickly 
followed by other similar discoveries. As a matter of fact these 
discoveries of seeds scarcely touched the problem of the origin of 
the group, because the seeds in question were good, typical, well 
developed seeds, on a level with those of Cycads and much too 
advanced to throw light on the origin of the organ. So the question 
of the derivation of these plants remained in very nearly—though 
not quite—the same condition as before these recent discoveries. 
With regard to the anatomical characters they indicated a clear 
affinity with the Ferns rather than with any other group of Pterido- 
phytes. He would shew them a lantern slide of a transverse section 
of a very young stem of Lyginodendron oldhamium —one of the 
most completely known of fossil plants, since we knew its stem, 
