preferred, however, to combine the two under the specific name, and have also included the synonymy of both under the same head.

The Californian forms,, var. Californicum, Eaton, and var. angulare, Braun, are, broadly speaking, distinguished from the type by the pinnæ of the former being less, of the latter more divided. In var. Californicum, which is more like a hybrid between A. munitum and A. aculeatum than anything else, the fronds are much elongated, scarcely narrowed at the base, and so little divided that even the superior basal segment is scarcely distinct as a pinnule and is not at all auricled. In var. angulare the fronds, which are lighter colored and less stiff, rigid and prickly-looking, are scarcely or not at all narrowed at the base, and so much divided as to be truly bipinnate, the pinnules being distinctly shortstalked, mostly auricled, slightly incised, and the superior basal one often again pinnatifid. Var. Brauni, Doell, differs in being less rigid and much thinner in texture, with shorter stalk, more narrowed base, and more divided pinnæ, the lower of which are obtuse; the pinnules, too, which are more distinct and auricled, have short stalks and truncate, rectangular bases, while the under or both sides of the fronds are covered with characteristic, long, soft hairs, which are absent or very scanty in true aculeatum. Var. scopulinum, D. C. Eaton, is readily recognized by its short, narrowly lanceolate, almost smooth fronds, which have ovate, rather obtuse pinnæ, with less aculeate teeth.

Of a Canadian example sent him, Professor Eaton remarks:-" I have not before this seen anything just like your specimen. It is more exactly the European var. lobatum than any I have had from California, the difference being in the firmer texture of your plant, and the decidedly more aculeate teeth of the pinnules."

Heretofore the only forms of A. aculeatum known to be Canadian were vars. Braunii and scopulinum, the specimens now referred to the type having been received in 1886 from Mr. J. R. Anderson of Victoria, B. Col., who informs me they were collected in moist, rocky places at Port Simpson, on Portland Inlet, Northern B. Col.

Genus XV.-CYSTOPTERIS, Bernh.

2.-C. BULBIFERA, Bernh. "Very abundant about Lower St. John, Coldbrook,-Hay." (Fowler, in Bull. Nat. Hist. Soc. N. B., No. IV.)

3.-C. MONTANA, Bernh. Abundant for about one hundred yards along a spring brook, which ran through spruce woods, about ten miles from the H. B. Co.'s. post on Lake Mistassini, N. E. Terr.-J. M. Macoun. A few yards of soil on either side of the creek was covered with thick moss, in which, and up to the edge of the stream, grew the fern, the roots in some cases growing right in the water. Some of the specimens were very large, measuring about twenty inches in height.

Genus XVI.-ONOCLEA, L.

1.-O. SENSIBILIS, L., var. OBTUSILOBATA, Torr. "Richibucto,-Fowler; Havelock, King's Co.,-Brittain." (Fowler, in Bull. Nat. Hist. Soc. N. B., No. IV.)

Genus XVII.-WOODSIA, R. Br.

1.—W. GLABELLA, R. Br. In Rev. J. Fowler's new list of New Brunswick plants

Sec. IV., 1886. 3.

(Bull. Nat. Hist. Soc. N. B., No. IV.) the specimens collected at the Tunnel in Restigouche by Mr. Fowler, and at Grand Falls by Mr. Jack, are named W. hyperborea. Mr. Jack's Grand Falls plant, however, which I have examined, is undoubtedly true W. gla

bella.

4.-W. OBTUSA, Torr. A specimen collected amongst loose rocks at Port Simpson, on Portland Inlet, Northern B. Col., and supplied by Mr. J. R. Anderson, has broad though very thin indusia and so is undoubtedly genuine W. obtusa. This important discovery renders it possible that Dr. Lyall's plants, collected on the Galton Mountains, B. Col., in 1861, may after all be this species, and not W. scopulina, as was stated in "Canadian Filicineæ" (Trans. Roy. Soc. Can., Vol. II, Sect. IV, p. 174), Professor Eaton, with whom I have communicated on the subject, informing me, that he has never personally examined Dr. Lyall's specimens. Our known stations for this rare Canadian fern are now, therefore, two in number, and strangely far apart, the one being in Nova Scotia, the other in British Columbia.

5.-W. SCOPULINA, D. C. Eaton. Specimens, thickly glandular on the upper as well as the lower surface, have been received from Mr. Anderson, who says it grows abundantly amongst loose rocks on Mount Finlayson and other hills about Victoria, B. Col.

6.-W. OREGANA, D. C. Eaton. The range of this species has been extended along the Thompson River to Kamloops, B. Col., where typical specimens, but of rather stunted growth, were collected in crevices of dry rocks exposed to intense heat and sunlight, by Mr. Jas. Fletcher of Ottawa, in June, 1885.

Genus XX.-OSMUNDA, L.

1.—0. REGALIS, L. Abundant around Lake Mistassini, N. E. Terr.—J. M. Macoun.

2.-O. CLAYTONIANA, L. Very abundant among boulders all around the margin of Lake Mistassini, N. E. Terr., and back from the lake in woods on higher ground.-J. M. Macoun.

III. On the Fossil Plants of the Laramie Formation of Canada.

By SIR J. WILLIAM DAWSON, C.M.G., LL.D., F.R.S.

(Presented May 27, 1886.)

I. INTRODUCTORY.

The following paper is a continuation, and in so far a completion, of those on the Mesozoic Floras of Canada contained in Vols. I and III of these Transactions.

On the geological map of Canada, the Laramie series, formerly known as the Lignitic or Lignite Tertiary, occurs, with the exception of a few outliers, in two large areas west of the 100th meridian, and separated from each other by a tract of older Cretaceous rocks, over which the Laramie beds may have extended, before the later denudation of the region.

The most eastern of these areas, that of the Souris River and Wood Mountain, extends for some distance along the United States boundary, between the 102nd and 109th meridians, and reaches northward to about thirty miles south of the "elbow" of the South Saskatchewan River, which is on the parallel of 51° north. In this area, the lowest beds of the Laramie are seen to rest on those of the Fox Hill group of the Upper Cretaceous, and at one point on the west they are overlaid by beds of Miocene Tertiary age, observed by Mr. McConnell, of the Geological Survey, in the Cypress Hills, and referred by Cope, on the evidence of mammalian remains, to the White River division of the United States geologists, which is regarded by them as Lower Miocene.' The age of the Laramie beds is thus stratigraphically determined to be between the Fox Hill Cretaceous and the Lower Miocene. They are also undoubtedly continuous with the Fort Union group of the United States geologists on the other side of the international boundary, and they contain similar fossil plants. They are divisible into two groups,a lower, mostly argillaceous, and to which the name of "Bad Lands beds " may be given from the "bad lands" of Wood Mountain where they are well exposed, and an upper, partly arenaceous member, which may be named the Souris River or Porcupine Creek division. In the lower division are found reptilian remains of Upper Cretaceous type, with some fish remains more nearly akin to those of the Eocene. Neither division has as yet afforded mammalian remains.

The western area is of still larger dimensions, and extends along the eastern base of the Rocky Mountains from the United States boundary to about the 55th parallel of latitude, and stretches eastward to the 111th Meridian. In this area and more especially in its southern part, the officers of the Geological Survey of Canada have recognized three

1 Report of Geol. Survey of Canada, 1885.

2 Cope in Dr. G. M. Dawson's Report on 49th parallel.

(2) A

divisions as follows:-(1) The Lower Laramie or St. Mary River series, corresponding in its character and fossils to the Lower or Bad Lands division of the other area. Middle division, the Willow Creek beds, consisting of clays, mostly reddish, and not recognized in the other area. (3) The Upper Laramie or Porcupine Hills division, corresponding in fossils and to some extent in mineral character to the Souris River beds of the eastern area.

The fossil plants collected by Dr. G. M. Dawson in the eastern area were noticed by the writer in an appendix to Dr. Dawson's Report on the 49th parallel, in 1875, and a collection subsequently made by Dr. Selwyn was described in the report of the Geological Survey of Canada for 1879-80. Those of the western area, and especially collections made by myself near Calgary in 1883, were shortly noticed in my paper in Vol. III of these Transactions. The present paper includes a revision of this former work, with the results of the study of new material collected, principally by Mr. J. B. Tyrrell and Mr. T. C. Weston of the Geological Survey, in the western area, and submitted to me along with the previous collections by the Director of the Geological Survey.

In studying these fossil plants, I have found that there is a close correspondence between those of the Lower and Upper Laramie in the two areas above referred to respectively, and that the flora of the Lower Laramie is somewhat distinct from that of the Upper, the former being especially rich in certain aquatic plants, and the latter much more copious on the whole, and much more rich in remains of forest trees. This is, however, possibly an effect rather of local conditions than of any considerable change in the flora, since some Upper Laramie forms recur as low as the Belly River series of the Cretaceous, which is believed on stratigraphical grounds to be considerably older than the Lower Laramie.

With reference to the correlation of these beds with those of the United States, some difficulty has arisen from the tendency of palæobotanists to refer the plants of the Upper Laramie to the Miocene age, although in the reports of Mr. Clarence King, the late Director of the United States Geological Survey, these beds are classed on the evidence of stratigraphy and animal fossils, as Upper Cretaceous. More recently, however, and partly perhaps in consequence of the views maintained by the writer since 1875, some change of opinion has occurred, and Dr. Newberry and Mr. Lesquereux seem now inclined to admit that what in Canada we recognize as Upper Laramie, is really Eocene, and the Lower Laramie either Cretaceous or a transition group between this and the Eocene. In a recent paper,' Dr. Newberry gives a comparative table, in which he correlates the Lower Laramie with the Upper Cretaceous of Vancouver Island and the Faxœ and Maestricht beds of Europe, while he regards the Upper Laramie as equivalent to European Eocene. Except in so far as the equivalence of the Lower Laramie and Vancouver Island beds is concerned, this corresponds very nearly with the conclusions of the writer in his paper read to this Society last year, namely, that we must either regard the Laramie as a transition Cretaceo-Eocene group, or must institute our line of separation in the Willow Creek or Middle Laramie division, which has, however, as yet afforded no fossil plants. I doubt, however, the equivalence of the Vancouver beds and the Lower Laramie, except

1 Newberry, Trans. N. Y. Academy, Feb., 1886.

2 Ibid., Vol. iii.

perhaps in so far as the upper member of the former is concerned.1 I have also to observe that in the latest report of Mr. Lesquereux he still seems to retain in the Miocene certain formations in the west, which from their fossil plants I should be inclined to regard as Eocene.

In my original studies of the specimens described in this paper, I had examined and noted separately the collections from the eastern and western areas; but as these obviously correspond in their divisions, and several of the species are identical, I have, to avoid repetition, placed the whole together; noting, however, the localities in which the specimens were obtained, and their reference to the Lower or Upper divisions.

I may state here my obligations to the reports of Lesquereux on the Tertiary Flora of the United States, and more especially to Dr. Newberry's Memoir on the Later Extinct Floras of America, and to the volume of plates published in illustration of it by the United States Geological Survey as these, referring to localities adjoining the Canadian boundary and to beds continuous with ours, have proved of the greatest value for purposes of comparison.

4

II. DESCRIPTIONS OF SPECIES.

1. Filices.

ONOCLEA SENSIBILIS, Linn.

Newberry, Later Extinct Floras of America, p. 39, and Volume of Illustrations, published by the Geological Survey of the Territories of the United States, 1878. Report by Dr. G. M. Dawson, on the Geology of the 49th Parallel, Appendix A.

Leaves of this species are abundant in the beds of Porcupine Creek, (long. 106°) near the international boundary, which are of Upper Laramie age. They are also found in the Lower Laramie of the same district at the Bad Lands of Wood Mountain. The species has also been recognized in the plant beds of the Isle of Mull on the Scottish coast. These were at one time regarded as Miocene, but are now recognized by Mr. Starkie Gardiner as Eocene. It is a very common American fern at the present day, ranging from Northern Canada to Pennsylvania and southward, and from the Atlantic coast into the interior. It vindicates its claim to be a long-lived species by its present wide distribution, and the considerable varieties of station in which it can flourish. Though living in America it has become extinct in Europe. Newberry describes it from the Fort Union group, in which, as well as at Porcupine Creek, it is very abundant. Dr. Newberry notices the fact that the fossil fronds are intermediate between the common modern variety and var. obtusiloba of Torrey.

Collected by Dr. G. M. Dawson, whose collections in the remainder of the paper will be indicated by the letters G. M. D.

DAVALLIA (STENOLOMA) TENUIFOLIA, Linn. (Plate I, Fig. 1.)

Report on 49th Parallel, p. 329, Pl. XVI, Figs. 1 and 2.

This species is found at Porcupine Creek with the preceding, but is more rare.

1 Protection Island beds of my paper, Trans. Roy. Soc. Can., Vol. i.

2 Cretaceous and Tertiary Plants.

3 Annals of New York Lyceum, 1868.

Illustrations of Cretaceous and Tertiary Plants, 1878.

Ι