I. Studies on the structure and affinities of cretaceous plants

Abstract

Abstract The unique interest and importance of the palæobotanical work already done on the Palæozoic flora depends in a great measure on the nature of the fossil remains which were available for investigation. Were equally favourable material to be had from any other epoch, there is no doubt that it would be of just as great anatomical and phylogenetic interest. It has been our inestimable good fortune to obtain petrified débris from the Mesozoic, so that we have been able to examine fragments of a variety of plants lying together as they drifted from the Cretaceous forests. The nodules in which these petrifactions occur are very comparable with the nodules in the Palæozoic, as has been described in a separate paper by one of us (Stopes, 1909). They appear to be the only known structures of Mesozoic age in which such petrified plants occur.