The Geological History of PlantsDawson, John William, Sir
Science
The Geological History of Plants
Dawson, John William, Sir
Paleobotany
[BH] "Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society," 1860.
[BI] The genus to which the well-known _Cyclopteris_ (_Adiantites_)
_Hibernicus_ of the Devonian of Ireland belongs.
I have elsewhere remarked on the fact that trunks, and petioles, and
pinnules of ferns are curiously dissociated in the Devonian beds--an
effect of water-sorting, characteristic of a period in which the
conditions of deposition were so varied. Another example of this is,
that in the sandstones of Gaspé Bay, which have not as yet afforded
any example of fronds of ferns, there are compressed trunks, which Mr.
Lockwood's specimens allow me at least to conjecture may have belonged
to tree-ferns, although none of them are sufficiently perfect for
description.
Mr. Lockwood's collection includes specimens of _Psaronius textilis_; and
in addition to these there are remains of erect stems somewhat different
in character, yet possibly belonging to the higher parts of the same
species of tree-fern. One of these is a stem crushed in such a manner
that it does not exhibit its form with any distinctness, but surrounded
by smooth, cylindrical roots, radiating from it in bundles, proceeding at
first horizontally, and then curving downward, and sometimes terminating
in rounded ends. They resemble in form and size the aërial roots of
_Psaronius Erianus_; and I believe them to be similar roots from a higher
part of the stem, and some of them young and not prolonged sufficiently
far to reach the ground. This specimen would thus represent the stem
of _P. Erianus_ at a higher level than those previously found. We can
thus in imagination restore the trunk and crown of this once graceful
tree-fern, though we have not the detail of its fronds. Mr. Lockwood's
collections also contain a specimen of the large fern-petiole which I
have named _Rhachiopteris punctata_. My original specimen was obtained by
Prof. Hall from the same horizon in New York. That of Mr. Lockwood is of
larger size, but retains no remains of the frond. It must have belonged
to a species quite distinct from _Caulopteris Lockwoodi_, but which may,
like it, have been a tree-fern.
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