338 PROCEEDINGS: BOSTON SOCIETY NATURAL HISTORY. 
Abietineae and particularly as to the greater age of the Pineae ("Die 
fossilen Holzer von Konig Karls Land," Kong. Svensk. Vetenskaps- 
Akad. Handlingar, Stockliolm, vol. 42, no. 10, 1908). Apropos of a 
new genvis from the Jurassic strata of King Karl's Land, Protopice- 
oxylon, which shows normally only vertical resin canals but which 
gave rise to canals in the horizontal plane as the result of injury, he 
expresses the view that the vertical canals appeared first and that they 
were followed by those in the horizontal plane. This view is clearly 
at variance with the known facts regarding the structure of the older 
Pityoxyla. Penhallow has described a species of Pityoxylon from the 
Permian of the State of Kansas, which has horizontal resin canals only, 
while Goppert from the Carboniferous of Waldenburg has described 
another Pityoxylon with resin canals confined to the horizontal plane 
(Penhallow, "North American Species of Dadoxylon," Trans. Roy. 
Soc. Canada, ser. 2, vol. 6, 1900; Goppert, "Revision meiner Ar- 
beiten," Bot. Centralbl, vol. 5, p. 405, 1881). It is thus obvious that 
so far as the paleobotanical evidence goes, the horizontal resin canal is 
more ancient in the wood of the Conifers than is the vertical. In view 
of all the evidence which has been recently accumulated, there appears 
to be now no doubt, in the present state of our knowledge at any rate, 
that the type of Conifer with short-shoots and ligneous resin canals 
is very old and of greater antiquity than the type presented by the 
living Abies and the representatives of the Sequoiineae and Cupres- 
sineae. The short-shoot even figured in the earlier Araucarineae as 
the present writer will show- in an article shortly to appear. 
Summary. 
1. There was present in the flora represented in the Lower Creta- 
ceous clays of Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts, a Coniferous species 
belonging to the genus Prepinus Jeffrey. 
2. This shows appreciable differences from the type species, P. 
statenensis , and on that account is named P. viticetensis. 
3. Those Abietineae with ligneous resin canals are the oldest 
representatives of the tribe, as is shown both by the organization of the 
archaic genus Prepinus and the structure of the oldest described 
species of Pityoxyla. 
4. The Abietineae are the oldest tribe of Conifers. 
Printed July, 1910. 
