NOTES. 
STUDIES ON THE STRUCTURE AND AFFINITIES OF CRETACEOUS 
PLANTS.—(ABSTRACT). (From the Proceedings of the Royal Society, 1909.)— 
The authors comment on the importance of the work done on the flora of the Palaeozoic 
period, and the botanical interest that would attach to similar petrifactions of plants 
from all ages of the Mesozoic period. They have had the good fortune to find 
excellently preserved material from the Cretaceous of Northern Japan. 
In the present paper they describe eighteen plants from this material, which is 
extraordinarily rich. As hitherto there has been very little known from anatomical 
material of plants of this age, the present paper is by no means final, but is in the 
nature of a pioneer chart of the ground. 
The petrifaction of the cells of the plants is often extremely good, though the 
fragments are not so complete as could be desired. The plant structures include 
stems, roots, leaves, cones, fern sporangia, and even an Angiospermic flower, the 
first petrifaction of a flower to be described. The ddbris lie together in the nodules 
in much the same way that the ddbris lie in the Coal-balls of the Palaeozoic, though 
they are mixed with fragments of shells. The latter are largely Ammonites and 
serve to determine the age of the petrifactions. 
The flora, as a whole, represents an interesting mixed flora such as has not 
hitherto come to light among petrifactions. 
Roughly speaking, the flora seems to have consisted of about one-third Angio- 
sperms, slightly more than one-third Gymnosperms, and the rest of ferns and lower 
plants. The anatomy of the early Angiosperms being such a desideratum in botany, 
their presence in the petrifactions renders them doubly interesting, and particularly 
when they are found in so evenly balanced a mixed flora. 
All the specimens described in this paper were cut in Tokio in the botanical 
department by the authors. 
The plants described are as follows:— 
Petrosphaeria japonica , gen. et spec. nov. A fungus which has numerous micro- 
sclerotia, in the periderm of one of the Angiosperms, Saururopsis . 
Schizaeopteris Tansleyi , gen. et. spec. nov. The sorus and sporangia of a Schizae- 
aceous fern. 
Fasciostelopteris mesozoica , gen. et spec. nov. The stem and petiole of a fern with 
a dictyostelic anatomy. Probably allied to the Dicksoniaceae. 
Fern rootlets, in excellent state of preservation, showing the diarch stele of the 
leptosporangiate ferns. 
Niponophyllum cordaitiforme , gen, et spec. nov. The leaf of what appears to be some 
plant of Cycadean affinity, the anatomy bearing considerable resemblance to that 
of Cordaites. 
[Annals of Botany, Vol. XXIV. No. XCIII. January, 1910.] 
