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NOTICE OF A FOSSIL LYCOPODIACEOUS FRUIT. 3
most remarkable circumstance is that the barks of trees so varvin2; in
leaf and flower as are doubtless the negr'Ma, the morada, and the
naranjada, should so far resemble each other as to pass under the
general name of Calimya. But so it is;* and if the morada be at all
allied to the C. purpurea, it must be remembered that, in the essential
requisite of the bark- clothing, it differs widely from its Peruvian name-
sake. The naranjada and verde (if, indeed, plants in my possession
turn out to be of these kinds), diiier so widely in the leaves, that I
shall not venture on their description here, except to remark that the
naranjada has scrobicules not only at the axils of the veins, but also
at their junction with the smaller veins, as in the Olea scrobiculata.
To what possible cause, since imitation is excluded, can we ascribe
that harmony which, as Dr. Seemann has remarked, seems to prevail
even in these obscure departments of vegetable physiology ? The in-
fluences of soil and climate would surely tell as soon upon the leaves
as upon the bark, yet these barks assimilate, whilst the leaves do not.
NOTICE OF A FOSSIL LYCOPODIACEOUS FRUIT.
By M. Brongniaut.
{Translated from the ' Comptes Mendus des Seances de VAcademic des
Sciences,'' vol. Ixrii. ; Seance Aoilt 17, 1868.)
The study of the vegetable fossils of the palaeozoic rocks presents a
peculiar interest on account of their singular forms, which generally
separate them in a very remarkable manner from the plauts now living
on the earth.
With the exception of the Ferns, which have a similar form through-
out aE. time, the other plants of the coal period differ so greatly from
those of the later periods, as well as those now living, that the most
careful examination has failed to refer them to families of recent
plants.
However, since I began my researches, I have determined the affini-
ties of several arborescent plants of this period to Equisetacea and Ly-
copodiacece.
* Compare Guiboui't, 'Drogues Simples,' 1850, t. iii. pp. 135, 136.
B 2