54. NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 
drupi‘* impressions of a cortical reticulum from the Upper 
Devonian of Ellesmere Land. 
As pointed out by Seward,?® this type of cortex is not confined 
to a single genus of plants, nor even to a single group, since it is 
found in Pteridosperms and also occurs in some Paleozoic lyco- 
podiaceous stems, and therefore can not be considered a safe crite- 
rion of botanical affinity. The name Lyginodendron is nothing more 
than a form name, therefore; and can serve only as a convenient 
catch-all for plants of unknown affinities. 
Fortunately during the same summer that the Manorkill (1120- 
foot level) tree horizon was located, while operations were under 
way for the removal of the new stumps, through the keen observation. 
of Dr Rudolf Ruedemann who was on the look-out for seeds in 
Upper Devonian rocks, there was discovered partly buried in the 
bed of the Schoharie creek, a loose block of shale covered with 
fructifications. The slab was traced to its source at the south side 
of the lower falls of the Manorkill about 15 feet above the base of 
the falls and 100 feet below the tree horizon. At this time a few 
specimens were obtained. Later in that same season and again in 
the summer of 1922 that and other localities were worked and 
reworked until a fair-sized collection has been obtained containing 
seeds (megasporangia), male fructifications, pieces of foliage and 
roots. Besides these Gilboa trees, occurring in large numbers, only 
specimens of a Protolepidodendron have been found, and these not 
in abundance; also the shale layer in which the fruiting bodies were 
found is at the same level (1020 feet) as the shale layer in which 
rested the bases of the stumps of the first-discovered locality. The 
above facts leave no doubt that the fruiting bodies, foliage and 
roots, occurring so frequently wherever the shale layers in question 
can be worked, belong to the Gilboa trees. 
The presence of seed ferns in the Upper Devonian rocks has long 
been predicted. Back in 1912 Johnson of the Royal College of 
Science for Ireland, Dublin, found in the Upper’ Devonian beds at 
Kiltorcan, County Kilkenny, impressions indicating the presence of 
the seeds and microsporangia of a Devonian plant, suggesting that 
heterospory was already well pronounced at this epoch. The speci- 
mens were reserved for description in the hope that specimens show- 
ing the parentage of the seed would turn up. With this hope unful- 
* Die Oberdevonische Flora des Ellesmere-landes. Report 2d Nor- 
wegian Arctic Exped. “Fram” 1898-1902. No. I, 1904, p. II, 12, pl. 1, 
fig. 1; pl. 2, figs. 1, 2. 
* Ref. cited; also 1910, 2:220. 
