^^^ 1if_;V: -'ifV' e il.-^ ^ JErs-^' ■,.><-, ^^%. ^^? ~ £ 3 \ '^ L \ . i ^ Q : ^ THE CANADIAN NATURALIST AND ^Maft«);ty journal ot ^dmtt WITH THE PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY OF MONTREAL: CONDUCTED BY A COMMITTEE OF THE SOCIETY, NEW SEEIES-Vol. 6. MONTREAL : DAWSON BKOTHERS, Nos. 159 and 161 ST. JAMES STREET. Jr>' 1872. .^P* The Editors of this Journal are responsible only for such communications as bear their names or initials. EDITING COMMITTEE. Acting Editor. — J. F. Whitbaves, F.G.S J. W. Dawson, LL.D., F.K.S. T. Sterry Hunt, LL.D., F.K.S C. Smallwood, M.D., LL.D., D.C.L E. Billings, F.G.S. P. P. Carpenter, B.A., Ph. D. David A. P. Watt. J. B. Edwards, Ph. D., D.C.L., Chairman. CORRESPONDING EDITORS. Halifax, N. S.— Prof. G. Lawson, Ph. D., LL.D. St. Johns, N.B.— G. F. Matthew, F.G.S. : London, Ont. — W. Saunders. Entered, according to the Act of the Parliament of Canada, in the year one thousand eight hundred and seventy-two, by Dawson Brothers, in the Office of the Minister of Agriculture. INDEX. Page Agassiz, Prof. L., Expedition of 356 " " on a Fish Nest in Sea AVeed 354 " *' on an existing Crustacean allied to the Trilobites 358 Agraulos ajffinis, species described 473 " socialis " " 472 Anapolenufi venustus " 474 Anderson Dr., on the Whale of the St. Lawrence 203 Andrews T., President's Address by 160 Arthraria antiquata, species described 467 Asindella terranovica " " 478 Bailey Prof. L. W., on the Geology of the Grand Manan 43 Balsena mysticetus 206 Barrande's " Colonies " reviewed by Dr. Nicholson 188 " Letter on Vermont Trilobites 460 " Letter on the Point Levis Fossils 462 Billings E., on the Taconic Controversy 313 " additional notes on 460 " on a Question of Priority 330 '' on a Fossil in the AVinooska Marble 351 " on the genus Obolellina 326 " on Primordial Fossils from Newfoundland 465 " new species of Fossils 213 Boulder-clay, Dawson on the 24 British Association. — See Contents. Cambrian and Silurian, History of, by Dr. T. S. Hunt 281 " Upper, " 281 " Middle and Lower " 294 " in North America, " 417 Chironectes pictus, nest of 356 Coal in Nova Scotia 61 Crinoids, Wy\'ille Thomson on 345 Cruziana similis, species described 469 Carpenter Dr. P. P. on Choristes 392 Choriates elegans, Carpenter, new genus and species described 392 Dana, J. D., on the Legs of Trilobites 348 " " award of the Wollaston Medal to 363 " " on the true Taconic 479 Dawson Dr. J. W., Annual Address by 1 " " on the Post-pliocene of Canada 19, 166, 2il, 369 Vol. VI. X No. 4. 482 INDEX. Page Darwin Charles, the Origin of Species reviewed 9 Dithyrocaris Belli 19 Dredging in Lake Superior by S. J. Smith 362 " in Gulf of St. Lawrence by J. F. Whiteaves 351 Emmons, letter on the Taconic 325 Echinodermata, of the Post-pliocene 258 Eophyton Linnseanum 462 " Jukesi, species described 467 Fish nest in Sea-weed, by Agassiz 354 Fishes, the Food of Marine 107 Food of Marine Fishes, Verrill on 107 " Salmon '. Ill Ford S. W., on Primordial Rocks 209 Geographical Science in Schools 121 Geological Survey, Reports for 1866-69 noticed 60 Geology of the Island of Grand Manan 43 '' New Brunswick, Matthew on 89 Glacial Epoch in New Brunswick 89 Grand Manan, Bailey on the Geology of the 43 Hall Prof. J., on the Fossils of the Red Sandrock 323 Hartley Edward, Obituary notice of 1, 119 Hisinger, on the Swedish Palaeozoic Rocks 295 Hitchcock C, first observations of Fossils in the Red Sandrock 323 Hunt, Dr. T. S., History of the names Cambrian and Silurian 281 " " on Oil-bearing Limestone 54 " " Obituary notice by 119 Hydrozoa of the Post-pliocene 258 Hyolithes, new species of 213 " excellens, species described 471 Hyolithellus micans, Billings 240 Iphidea bella, new genus and species described 477 Iron-sands in Canada 79 Jeffreys, J. Gwjti, on Waldheimia septigera and Terebratula septata 368 Johnston Dr. Keith, Obituary notice of 122 Lamellibranchiata of the Post-pliocene 374 Leda Clay, Dawson on the 34 Limestones, Hunt on Oil-bearing 54 Lingula Murrayi, species described 467 Lingulella ? affinis, " " 468 " spissa 468 Logan, Sir W. E., letter on the Quebec Group 324 Macfarlane T., on Crystalline Rocks 259 Matthew G. F., Surface Geology of New Brunswick 89 Meteorology of Montreal for 1871, by Dr. Smallwood 334 Mitchell Hon. P., letter from on Dredging 341 Mivart St. George, the Origin of Species reviewed 9 Monomerella, new species of 220 INDEX. 483 Page Murchison Sir R. J., Obituary notice of 234 '^ " on the Quebec Grroup 324 Natural History Society.— See Contents. New Brunswick, Matthew on the Geology of 89 Newberry on the ancient Lakes of America . . • 112 Nicholson Dr. H. A., on the "' Colonies " of Barrande 188 " " on Sexual Selection in Man 449 Obolella, new species of 217 " miser, species described 468 Oholellina Canadensis 326 " Galtensis 329 (( magnifica 329 Palaeozoic Rocks of England and America, by Dr. T. Sterry Hunt 312 Paradoxides tenellus, species described 476 " decorus 476 Plants, the popular names of 231 Platyceras jJ'rimsevum 220 Post Pliocene of Canada, by Dr. J. W. Dawson 19, 341, 371 " Protozoa, " 353 " Hydrozoa, " 258 " Echinodermata, " 258 '' Heterobranchiata, " 370 " Brachiopoda, " 373 " Lamellibranchiata, " 374 " Gasteropoda, " 386 " Annulata, " 400 " Crustacea, " 401 " Vertebrata, " 403 " Fossil Plants, " 404 " Summary of Fossils, " 405 Primordial Rocks, fossils from 209 Red Sandrock, determination of the age of 320 " on Fossils of, by Prof. J. Hall 321 Ritchie A. R., obituary notice of 1 Rocks, Classification of, by T. Macfarlane 259 " Mineralogical constitution of — 259 " Essential Minerals of 261 '' Accessorial Constituents of 267 " Order of Development 271 " Specific gravity of 277 Salt Regions of Canada 70 Saxicava Sand, Dawson on the 37 Scenella reticulata 479 Sexual Selection in Man, Dr. Nicholson on 449 Silurian and Cambrian in Great Britain, Dr. Hunt on 281 Smallwood Dr., Meteorological Results for Montreal, 1871 334 Smith S. J., on Lake Superior Dredging 362 484 INDEX. Page Solar Chemistry 132 Solenopleura communis 474 Species, on the Origin of 9, 145, 150 Spectrum Analysis 129 Stenotheca pauper 479 Straparollina remota 471 Taconic Controversy, Billings on 313, 460 " System, Dana on 479 Terebratula neptatn 368 Thompson, Prof. Allan, Address by 146 Thompson, Sir Wm., Address before the British Association 129 Thomson, Prof. Wyville, on Palaeozoic Crinoids 345 Trilobite, a new Canadian 227 Verrill, on the Food of Marine Fishes 107 Whale of the St. Lawrence, Dr. Anderson on 203 Whiteaves, on Dredging in the Gulf 351 Waldheimia septigera 368 Woodward Henry, a new Devonian Fossil .... 18 " " on the Legs of Trilobites 350 Wollaston Medal, award of to Prof. J. D. Dana 363 Zoology and Botany.— See Contents. Published August, 1872. MITCHELL & WILSON, PRINTERS, 192 ST. PETER STREET, MONTREAL. CONTENTS. Page Annual Address of the President of the Natural History Society of Montreal. 1 The Origin of Species 9 On a new Fossil Crustacean from the Devonian Rocks of Canada. By Henry Woodward, F.G.S., F.Z.S '. 18 The Post-Pliocene Greology of Canada. By J. W. Dawson, LL.D., F.R.S- • • 19 On the Physiography and Geology of the Island of Grand Manan. By Prof. L. W. Bailey 43 On the Oil-bearing Limestone of Chicago. By T. Sterry Hunt, LL.D., F.R.S. 54 Geological Survey of Canada 60 On the Surface Geology of New Brunswick. By G. F. Matthew 89 On the Food and Habits of some of our Marine Fishes. By Prof. A. E.Verrill 107 Abstract of Proceedings of the British Association at Edinburgh, in 1871 129 The Post-Pliocene Geology of Canada. Part 2. By J. W. Dawson, LL.D. . 166 On the " Colonies " of M. Barrande. By Prof. H. A. Nicholson, M.D 188 The Whale of the St. Lawrence. By Dr. J. W. Anderson 203 Notes on the Primordial Rocks in the vicinity of Troy, N. Y. By S. W. Ford 209 On some new species of Palaeozoic Fossils. By E. Billings, F.G.S 213 The Post-Pliocene Geology of Canada. By J. W. Dawson, LL.D 241 On theOrigin and Classification of Original or Crystalline Rocks. By Thos. Macfarlane 259 History of the Names Cambrian and Silurian in Geology. By T. Starry Hunt, LL.D 281 Remarks on the Taconic Controversy. By E. Billings, F.G.S 313 On the Genus Obolellina. By E. Billings, F.G.S 326 Meteological Results for Montreal for the year 1871. By C. Small wood, M.D. 334 The Post-pliocene Geology of Canada. By J. W. Dawson, LL.D 369 History of the Names Cambrian and Silurian in Geology, By T. Sterry Hunt, LL.D t*. 417 Sexual Selection in Man. By Prof. H. Alleyne Nicholson, M.D 449 Additional Notes on the Taconic Controversy. By E. Billings, F.G.S 460 On some Fossils from the Primordial Rocks of Newfoundland. By E. Billings, F.G.S 464 What is True Taconic ? By Prof. James D. Dana 479 Geology and Mineralogy :— The Ancient Lakes of Western America 112 On the Canadian Trilobite with Legs 227 On the Structure of the Palaeozoic Crinoids 345 On the supposed Legs of the Trilobite, Asaphus platycephalus 348 Supposed Legs of Trilobites 350 Note on the discovery of Fossils in the Winooski Marble at Swanton, Vt. 351 11. CONTENTS. Page British Association :— The President's Address for 1871 129 Prof. Thomson's do 146 Mr. Andrew's do 160 Botany and Zoology :— Popular Names of Plants 231 Deep-Sea Dredging in the Gulf of St. Lawrence 351 Fish Nest in the Sea-weed of the Sargasso Sea 354 Prof. Agassiz's Expedition 356 Agassiz's Deep-Sea Explorations 358 Dredging in Lake Superior under the direction of U. S. Lake Sun^ey 361 Miscellaneous :— Obituary Notice of Mr. Edward Hartley 119 " " Dr. Keith Johnston 122 " " Sir Roderick J. Murchison, Bart., K. C. B 234 Geographical Science 120 Award of the WoUaston Medal to Prof. J. D. Dana 363 Additional Notes on Obolellina 365 Letter from J. Gwyn Jeflfreys 368 Natural History Society : Annual Address of President 1 Papers presented to 2 Annual Meeting 124 The Field-day for 1871 222 Index 481 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST AND ^luailfvly ^ouviml of f dcuft ANNUAL ADDRESS OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY OF MONTREAL, PRINCIPAL DAWSON, LL.D., F.R.S. Delivered May l^th, 1871. The first duty which devolves upon me in this address is a mournful one — that of referring to the departure from among us of two of our youngest and yet most useful and promising mem- bers, Mr. Alexander S. Ritchie, and Mr. Edward Hartley. Mr. Ritchie died in December list, at the age of 34. He had been connected with the Society for six years, and had contribu- ted to our proceedings seven origin-d papers on Entomology and Microscopy. His papers were characterized by minute and pains- taking research, and the facts which he studied were presented in a distinct and lucid manner and often very effectively. He was for some time a member of the Council and of the Editing Com- mittee, and at the time of his death occupied the honourable and useful position of Chairman of the Council. In Mr. Ritchie we have lost a man always ready for any useful work, and whilo active and enthusiastic, most gentle and unobtrusive in his man- ner, and thoroughly to be relied on for the performance of all that he undertook to do. Mr. Edward Hartley was a still younger man, and for a shor- ter time a member of this Society. He was born in Montreal, but received his scientific education at the Sheffield School of Yalo College, and was for some time engaged in mineral surveys in the Vol. VI. A No. X. 2 TH£ CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Yol. vi. United States. He subsequently became attached to the Geologi- cal Survey of Canada, and was employed more especially in the coal-fields of Nova Scotia, on which he prepared two elaborate and most valuable reports : one on the structure of a part of the Pictou coal-field, the other on the quality of the coals of Pictou. While in the midst of these useful labors he was suddenly struck down by disease, at the early age of 23. Mr. Hartley was a Fellow of the Greological Societies of London and of France, a member of the Institute of Civil Engineers of Scotland, and of the Institute of M in in 2: Eno-ineers of the North of Enuland, and of various local societies. His attainments in Mineralogy, in Geo- logy and in Mming Engineering were extraordinary for his years and gave promise of a brilliant career. Science in Montreal can little afford to lose two such men. THE SCIENTIFIC PAPERS PRESENTED to the Society in the past year have been numerous and valuable and most of them have been printed in full in our journal, the Canadian Naturalist. The following may be especially men- tioned : "Aquaria Studies," Part 2d, by Mr. A. S. Ritchie ; " On a specimen 0? Beluga recently discovered at Cornwall, Ontario," byE. Billings, Esq., F. G. S. '-On the Earthquake of October 20th, 1870, " by Principal Dawson, F. R. S. ; '■' On Canadian Phosphates, in their application to x\griculture, " by Gordon Broome, F.G.S. ; '• On the Origin of Granite," by G. A. Kinahan, Esq., of Dublin ; '-' Notes on Vegetable Productions, ; by Major G. E. Bulger; "On the species of Deer inhabiting Canada," by Prof. R. Bell, F. G. S. ; " On the Sanitary Condition of Mont- real," by Dr. P. P. Carpenter; '-'On the Foraminifera of the Gulf and River St. Lawrence, " by G. M. Dawson ; " On Cana- dian Foraminifera, " by J. F. Whiteaves, F. G. S. ; "' On some New Facts in Fossil Botany, " by Principal Dawson, F. R. S. ; "On the occurrence of Diamonds in New South Wales, " by Mr. Norman Taylor, and Prof. A. Thompson; communicated by A. R. C. Selwyn Esq., F. G. S. ; "' On the Structure and affinities of the Brachiopoda," by Prof. Morse; '-'On a Mineral Silicate injecting Palaeozoic Crinoids, " by Dr. T. Sterry Hunt, F. R. S. " On the Origin and Classification of Crystalline Rocks, " by Mr. Thomus Macfarlane ; "On the Plants of the West Coast of New- foundland, " by John Bell, M. A., M. D. ; " On Canadian Diato maceae, " by Mr. W. Osier ; " On the Botany of the Counties of Hastings and Addington," by B. J. Harrington, B, A. No. 1.] THE president's ADDRESS. 3 Beside these, we have reprinted in the Naturalist several im- portant papers by Dr. Hunt, Mr. Billings, and others, with the view of making them more fully known to students of nature in Canada. ERRONEOUS PUBLIC OPINIONS. Of the scientific value of these papers, and of the amount of original work which they evince, it is unnecessary that I should speak ; but it is sometimes alleged that societies of this kind are of no practical utility ; that their labours are merely the indus- trious idleness of unpractical dreamers and enthusiasts. Nothing' could be more unjust than such an assertion. Science, cultivated for its own sake, and without any reference to practical applica- tions, is a noble and elevating pursuit, full of beneficial influence on mental culture, and by the training which it affords, fitting- men for the practical business of life better than most other studies. Further, it is by this disinterested pursuit of science, for its own sake, that many of the most practically useful arts and improvements of arts have had their birth. Besides this, most of the investiji-ations of the naturalist have a direct bearins; on uti- litarian pursuits. In illustration of this statement I need go no further than our own last volume. An eminent example is afforded by the paper of Mr. Gordon Broome on Canadian phosphates. Here we have set before us three pregnant classes of facts : First — Phosphates are essential ingredients of all our cultivated plants, and especially of those which are most valuable as food. In order that they may grow, these plants must obtain phosphates from the soil, and if the quantity be deficient so will the crop. Of the ashes of wheat, 50 per cent consist of phosphoric acid, and without this the wheat cannot be produced ; nor if produced would it be so valuable as food. Second — The culture of cereals is constantly abstracting this valuable substance from our soils. The auilyses of Dr. Hunt have shown long ago that the principal cause of the exhaustion of the worn-out wheat lands of Canada is the with- drawal of the phosphates, and that fertility cannot be restored without replacing these. In 292,533 tons of wheat and wheaten flour exported from Montreal in 1869, there were, according to Mr. Broome, 2,340 tons of phosphoric acid, and this was equal to the total impoverishment of more than 70,000 acres of fertile land. To replace it would require, according to 31r. Broome, 5,850 tons of the richest natural phosphate of lime or 13,728 tons of super-phosphates as ordinarily sold, at a cost of more than 4 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. 6480,000. These facts become startling and alarming when we consider that very little phosphoric acid in any form is being applied to replace this enormous waste. Yet so great is now the demand for these manures that super-phosphates to the value of $8,750,000 are annually manufactured in England from mineral phosphate of lime, beside the extensive importations of bones and guano. Third — Canada is especially rich in natural mineral phos- phates, as yet little utilized, and might supply her own wants, and those of half the world beside, if industry and skill were directed to this object. Putting these three classes of facts together, as they are pre- sented by Mr. Broome, we have before us, on the one hand, an im- mense abyss of waste, poverty and depopulation yawning before our agricultural interests ; and on the other, inexhaustible sources of wealth and prosperity lying within reach of scientific skill, and the conditions necessary to utilize which were well pointed out in the paper referred to. It is true that these facts and conclusions have been previously stated and enforced, but they remain as an illustration of scientific truths of important practical value still very little acted on. Naturalists are sometimes accused of being so foolish as to chase butterflies, and the culture of cabbages is not usually regarded as a very scientific operation ; yet any one who reads a paper on the Cubbjge butterfly read at one of our meetings by the late Mr. Kitche, may easily discover that there may be practical utility in studying butterflies, and that science may be applied to the culture of the most commonplace of vegetables. A valuable crop, worth many thousands of dollars, is hopelessly destroyed by enemies not previously known, and appearing as if by magic. Entomology informs us that the destroyer is a well known European insect. It tells how it reached this country and that it might have been exterminated by a child in an a hour on its first appearance. But allow it to multiply unchecked, it soon fills all our gardens and fields with its devastating multitudes, and the cultivators of cabbages and cauliflowers are in despair. But Entomology pro- ceeds to show that the case is not yet hopeless, and that means may still be found to arrest its ravages. Unfortunately, we have as yet no public oflacial bureau of En- tomology, and therefore we must be indebted for such information to men who, like our late associate Bitchie, snatch from arduous business pursuits the hours that enable them thus to benefit their No, 1.] THE president's ADDRESS. 5 country. Ontario is in advance of us in this, and has in the pre- sent year produced an important contribution to practical science in the report of the Fruit Grower's Association, which includes, among other matters, three papers on applied Entomology ; that on Insects aifecting the Apple, by Rev. C. T. S. Bethune ; that on Insects affecting the Grrape, by Mr. N. Saunders ; and that on Insects affecting the Plum, by Mr. E. B. Reed. These are most creditable productions and of much practical value. I would mention here that though we have amonii^ us several diligent and successful students of insects, yet we have no one at, present who has taken up the mantle of Mr. Ritchie as a describer of their habits. I trust that some of our younger members will at once enter on this promising and useful field. WORK DONE. Looking at the amount of work done by our Society in the course of the year, I think it will bear comparison with that of similar societies elsewhere. We have not before us so larsje an amount of matter as that accumulated by the great central societies of the Mother Country and the United States ; but we exceed in this respect most of the local societies of Great Britain, outside of London, and most of those in America with the exception of a few of the more important. With regard to the quality of scientific matter, we can boast many papers of which any society might gladly take the credit, while all of the papers which we publish are at least of local value and importance. This Society is, on this account, now recognized as the chief exponent of Canadian Natural History, and its journal is sought by all interested in the aspects of nature in this part of America. The responsibility which devolves upon us in this aspect of our work, is, I think, worthy of our consideration, with reference to our future opera- tions, and to this subject I would desire to devote the remainder of this address. One of our functions as a local society I think we have well and efficiently performed. It is that of accumulating and arranging for study the natural productions of this country. Our collec- tions of mammals, birds, insects and mollusks of Canada are now nearly complete up to the present state of knowledge, and we have also valuable collections in other departments of Zoology. Our curator, Mr. Whiteaves, has done very much to give to these collections a scientific value by careful and accurate arrangement- 6 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. "We have not specially cultivated Canadian Geology, because we cannot hope to rival in this department the admirable collection of the Geological Survey ; but we have aimed at and secured a general collection, useful in educating the public taste and for giving aid to learners. Our collections in American Ethnology are not contemptible ; and at our last annual conversazione, by laying our friends under contribution, we were able to exhibit an admirable series of illustrations of the rude and simple arts of the tribes which preceded us in the occupation of this country. Of our library I cannot speak in as high praise as of our Museum. It should undoubtedly be one function of a Society like this to collect for the use of naturalists at least those books of reference which they would require to consult, and especisUy all books of value bearing on American Natural History. It is true that the University Library and that of the Gaological Sur- vey to some extent supply this want ; but there is still a large field in this department which we might occupy, and we should at least place the scientific periodicals of the day conveniently within the reach of our members. Nor is there anything more likely to prove attractive to the public than a well-stocked library and reading room, devoted especially to the scientific subjects which we cultivate. This subject is one with reference to which the Society should move vigorously in the coming year, either by soliciting special contributions for this purpose, by increasing the amount of its annual contributions from members, or by allying itself with other societies. It seems to have been an error in the construction of our building not to have provided larger space for accommodating a library and reading room, and if possible some amendment should be eff'ected in this. In our proper scientific work a boundless field lies before us. Scarcely any department of the natural history of this country has been satisfactorily worked out, and any active naturalist can find almost anywhere the material for original investigations, the results of which we are at all times ready to o-ive to the public. I have already referred to the subject of Entomology as applied to practical purposes ; and the natural history of our spiders, millepedes, and worms, is almost an untrodden field, while our microscopists have a vast and little explored domain in Canadian waters, with their multitudes of inhabitants of the humbler grades. There is much also yet to be done in Canadian fishes and reptiles. Mr. Whiteaves has made much progress in cata- No. 1.] THE president's ADDRESS. 7 loguing Canadian mollusca, but his work is by no means com- plete ; and such groups as the Nudibranchiates, the Tunicates and the Poljzoa, still lie in a very imperfect condition, though some materials have been accumulated. In connection with this subject, I would refer to the desirableness of exploring the deeper parts of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, in which, no doubt, many important additions to our fauna might be discovered, and which might throw much light on the post-pliocene geology of Canada. It is further much to be desired that an attempt should be made to ascertain the precise limits of the various marine animals in the brackish portions of the River St. Lawrence. In dredging in 3Iurray Bay, in the past years, I have been surprised to find so rich a boreal fauna in that part of the river, and I have no doubt that it must extend much further upward, sustained by the cold salt water which forces its way under the warmer and fresher water of the surface. It would be interesting to know how far the marine animals extend, and also what varietal changes occur in the species as they approach the fresher portions of the river. To prosecute such researches we would require public aid, and the want of this has hitherto limited our work in this direction. Last year a committee was appointed to consider the matter, but nothini;' was done. With a view to some action in the comino- summer, I have, as President of the Society, invited the attention of the Hon. the Minister of Marine to the subject, and have requested a passage for an observer appointed by the Society in one of the Government steamers or schooners. I have much pleasure in stating that he has entered heartily into my views, and that there is a prospect that, with the aid thus afforded, we may be able to reach with the dredge the deepest portions of the Gulf. Though these depths are small in comparison with those which have been reached in the Atlantic, I feel confident that they will afford a rich harvest of marine forms, not hitherto known to us, and that the results will be equally creditable to this Society and to the Government of Canada, which may thus, with little trouble and expense, emulate the Mother Country and the United States in the efforts which they are making to extend the knowledge of Marine Zoology. It is probable also that facts may ba obtained of practical value with reference to the fisheries- In Botany the two points which have chiefly engaged our at- tention are Geographical Distribution and the Cryptogamic orders. In the former, Mr. Drummond, Dr. Bell, and Mr. Matthew have 8 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. done good servicej but their labours merely sliow how much re- mains to be done. In the latter, Mr. Watt has been our prin- cipal worker; but here also, especially in the Algae and Fungi, there is scope for other observers. Some one might do a most important service by directing his attention to the Parasitic Fungi of this country. Geology, which presents the largest and most attractive field open to students of nature in Canada, has a most important public provision made for its culture in the Geological Survey. Still the function of this Society and of private workers is not unim- portant. Several of the officers of the Survey have made the journal and the meetings of this Society the vehicles of their more purely scientific researches. I need only mention the valu- able papers of Dr. T. Sterry Hunt on Chemical Geology, and those of Mr. Billings on Palaeontology, as illustrative of this. To Mr. Hartley, Mr. Robb, Mr. Vennor, Professor Bell, and Mr. Broome, we have also been indebted in this way. Mr. McFar- lane has enriched our journal with many valuable contributions, especially on the nature of rocks, and many of my own researches, especially in Post-pliocene Geology and Fossil Botany, have been published through the medium of the Society. The field for work is still, however, very wide ; more especially is there large scope for industrious collectors of fossils, if they would devote themselves to the thorough exploration of such formations as may be within their reach. PUBLIC PATRONAGE NEEDED. In conclusion, I must refer to what I regard as at present the most discouraging feature of our position. In the able address delivered last year by Br. DeSola, reference was made to the slender aid and countenance which this Society receives from the public, and the same subject is illustrated by the statistics of tlie Society in the reports of the Council for last year, and also for the present year. A Society like this, ofi'ering to the public a w-ell filled and well arranged museum, the advantage of attending its scientific meetings and public lectures, and of receiving its journal at a price little more than nominal, should need no ad- vertisement ; and this more especially when its working members are kbouring so successfully in enlarging the boundaries of know- ledge and promoting its .practical applications. Those of our citizens who are not themselves naturalists, should on these No. 1.] THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES. 9 grounds be members and contributors to its funds, merely as a public institute, creditable and useful to the city. But this is not all : they should also take an interest in its work. Nearly all the subjects which engage its attention possess some interest to any intelligent mind ; and I believe that it is much more from want of knowledae of that which we are doino', or from want of thought, than from any other causes, that so many fail to take advantage of the privileges which we offer. I am sure that there is no intellio'ent man who will not find in the advantao-es to which I have referred much more than an equivalent for his annual, subscription. Experience has, however, shown us that we cannot reckon on a work so unobtrusive as ours securing the attention it deserves. It will, therefore, be incumbent on the new Council to take steps as soon as possible for enlarging our membership by a direct appeal to the public. I trust that this will be successful, and that next year we shall be able to report that we have not only done useful work, but that our list of members has been greatly enlarged. THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES.^ (^From the New York " Kation.") The author of the '' Origin of Species " is more widely known, more eagerly read, more cordially admired, and more emphatically denounced than any other scientific man of the day. The inte- rest in him is in great measure due to the natural desire of humanity to penetrate that " mystery of mysteries " — its origin ; encomiums which even his warmest opponents (excepting those who are filled with the odium theologicuni) have bestowed upon him, are just tributes to his long and faithful labours, and to the modesty which has compelled others to award to him some of the credit he seemed loth to claim ; but much, if not all, of the in- dignation which many good persons feel towards him arises from misconceptions of his ideas respecting the Creator, which have * " The Origin of Species by means of Natural Selection, By Charles Darwin, F. K. S." Fifth edition. (Am. reprint.) New York : D. Appleton & Co. 1871. Pp. 447, 8vo. " The Genesis of Species. By St. George Mivart, F.R.S." London and New York ; Macraillan & Co. 1871. Pp. 296 (with illustrations). 10 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [A^ol. vi. their origin not in his own works, but in those of certain advo- cates of his general views. In truth, the candid reader of Darwin's own works can find little fault with his conceptions of the Creator so far as regards their sincerity, although it is evident that he regards the origin of species as a legitimate subject of scientific enquiry, and ignores, as well he may, the vain attempts to reconcile the conclusions to which he is led with the commonly received interpretation of Scripture. So does the author of the '•' Genesis of Species," who is, however, a professedly devout man, and gives many arguments and quotations, especially in the chapter on " Theology and Evo- lution," to show that neither '' Darwinism " nor any other deriva- tive theory necessarily conflicts in the least degree with the most orthodox relio-ious convictions. This leads to the needed correction of another grave miscon- ception— that " Darwinism " is synonymous with '' derivation " or ''evolution," and that either of these terms is equivalent to " transmutation." This idea has not only crept into the book catalogues, where all works upon the origin of species are grouped together under the title " Darwinismus," as if they treated of merely local varieties of the same intellectual epidemic, but it has also caused many who feel that Darwin's particular theory is wrong, to oppose all theories whatsoever involving the derivation of higher forms from lower. A sketch of the views which preceded his own is prefixed, by Darwin, to the later editions of his work ; but we have nowhere met with any grouping of these and subsequent theories which exhibits their relative nature. Such a classification we venture to oficr here, admitting the impossibility of more than indicating the salient points of each theory and the names of a few of its more zealous advocates. "We have also thought it best to omit the hypothesis of " acceleration and retardation," * recently pro- posed by Professor Cope, and spoken of by Principal Dawson as, in his view, " the most promising of all." f * " The Hypothesis of Evolation." University series. New Haven : C. C. Chatfield & Co. t For farther notice of the hypothesis here referred to, see Dr. Dawson's paper on " Modern Ideas of Derivation,'' in the Canadian A^f^wra^^s/; for June, 1869, page 134, and also the American Natural i&V for June, 1870, pp. 230-237, where, in a review of Dr. Dawson's paper, Prof. Alpheus Hyatt, of Boston, refers to an essay by himself " On the No. 1.] THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES. 11 Family. Gemjs. Species. Supporters. (T 1 „,^ i«r,<- S Pi'Otluction of adults Milton. inaepentlent ^ production of eggs Swedenborg. ^i„ „.- (Production (Transmutation — Lamarck. Creation - ) nf J v Dirwin I Derivative f ^^-^ '^ies ^^'^tural selection I^,F™. IDemative I p- Vestiges." I ( Production \ O^din-'^n' Genesis \ ? J/|««^- W of j I Mivart. ( Species 1. Parthenogenesis . . • Ferris. The above will explain itself to those who are already familiar with the subject, but a few words may be added for others. If the species of animals and plants were created independently of all other species, then they must have been made as either perfect and fully formed individuals or as seeds and eggs. The former view is here ascribed to Milton rather than to Moses or Scripture, because most intelligent people now admit that the earlier chap- parallelism between the different stages of life in the individual and those in the entire group of the molluscous order Tetrabranchiata." (Mem. Boston Soc. Nat. Hist. Vol. I, part ii, 1867.) Prof. Hyatt re- marks that Dr. Dawson has " given Prof. Cope the undivided credit of discovering the law of acceleration, whereas the memoir referred to above, which has escaped Dr Dawson's notice, "will remove all doubt that the aim of a large part of the observations there recorded, is identical with those of Prof. Cope's more elaborate es^aj\ We have no desire for controversy but feel that silence in the present instance would place in a false light the object of these in- vestigations, and vitiate the original value of the results of much labour not yet published." (Loc. cit. 234.) We may add that Prof. Hyatt's paper was read Feb. 21, 18CG, and Prof. Cope's on the Cyprinoid Fishes, in which his views were first enunciated, in Oct. 19 of the same year, though only published in the Trans. Amer, Philos. Soc, vol. 13, in 1869, after hi« elaborated views on the origin of species had appeared in the Proc. Phil. Acad. Sciences for 1868. No one who knows Prof. Cope can doubt that he, like Dr. Dawson and the author of the review here copied from The Nation, was unacquainted with the views of Prof. Hyatt. In justice to the latter, however, as an independent w^orker in this field, it is well to put these facts on record to avoid any future misconceptions. It should perhaps be explained that Dr. Dawson's reasons for pre- ferring the theory of Messrs. Hyatt and Cope did not imply any ad- hesion on his part to the hypothesis of derivation, but was based merely on the circumstance that the possibility of the passage of an animal from one genus to another by acceleration or retardation of development, seems to be proved by at least a few though perhaps (exceptional facts, open to observation ; while the change of one spe- cies into another is totally destitute of any observed examples or positive proof. — Eds. Canadian Naturalist. 12 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. tt'i's of Genesis cannot reasonably be interpreted in their literal sense ; so that for a distinct statement of this view we must look to the great English poet, who, however, was not a scientific man.'-"^ The idea that orscanisms were created as es-^s, which have a sim- pier structure, is less difficult to comprehend than the foregoing, but it is not easy to see how this could occur with the higher animals whose young are born alive, and not in the form of eggs. A rather vague enunciation of this idea is contained in a little work by Swedenborg,-]- which is probably to be regarded as purely j)hilosophical and not as one of his theological works. The second and more numerous family of theories is called " Derivative," because they all involve the supposition that in some way the lower and earlier forms have served as the means of producing higher and later ones. But it will be seen that they differ essentially as to the manner of this derivation. La- marck was impressed with the amount of variation in size and form which the parts of an animal may undergo in consequence of their use or disuse, and so indirectly from any desire or " appe- tency " which the animal experienced, e.g., a fish might thus become a quadruped if forced to live upon the land, and an ape might become a man. The amount of change in any one genera- tion might be very slight, but the next generation would inherit, increase, and perpetuate the transformation. In the endeavour to eive a concise statement of Darwin's own theory, we sufi"er from an " embarras de richesses ;" for not only is his own work one long presentation of it in many different aspects, but each later writer upon the subject has given his par- ticular version, and from a different stand-point. Summary ex- pressions of the theory are given by our author on pages 40, 70, 178, 412, 437 ; but a more diagrammatic enunciation is that of Wall-ace, who not only presented publicly an independent theory of natural selection at the same time with Darwin (1858), but has since paid a warm tribute to the latter' s work, while expres- sing a doubt respecting the sufficiency of that theory for the pro- duction of man. With a few unimportant changes, his presenta- tion is as follows : % * " Paradise Lost," Book VI. f '< Worship and Love of God," Section 3. X " Contributions to the Theory of Natural Selection." London and New York : 1870. Pp. 302. No. 1.] THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES. 13 "1. Tendency of individuals to increase in number, while yet the actual number remains stationary. " 2. A struggle for existence among those which compete for food and endeavour to escape death. "3. Survival of the fittest; meaning that those which die are least fitted to maintain their existence. ''4. Hereditary transmission of a general likeness. " 5. Individual diSerences among all. •' 6. Change of external conditions universal and unceasing. '' 1. Changes of organic forms to keep them in harmony with the changed conditions : and as the changes of condition are per- manent, in the sense of not reverting back to identical previous conditions, the changes of organic forms must be in the same sense permanent, and thus originate species." The following passages from the " Origin of Species " may aid the comprehension of what the author admits to be a complex hypothesis : " There is a struggle for existence leading to the preservation of profitable deviations of structure and insects" — (p. 412.) '• Natural selection acts solely through the preservation of advan- tageous variation, and it acts with extreme slowness, at long- intervals of time, and only on a few inhabitants of the same region " (p. 108.) ''It is not probable that variability is an in- herent and necessary contingent under all circumstances ; varia- bility is governed by many unknown laws (p. 50). "We are profoundly ignorant of the cause of each slight variation or indi- vidual difference (p. 192). "Nature gives successive variations ; mem adds them up in certain directions useful to him " (p. 40). We italicise man because ^we are convinced that the grand fallacy in Darwin's theory lies just here, in the assumption that the selection and propagation of useful variations by Dian is in any way comparable to what takes place in nature. AYhat is proved by all his works is this : that, so far as experience goes, no two created things are identical ; that in many cases naturalists differ in their estimate of the value of the distinctions existiug between individuals, so that what some call varieties others re2;ard as species (a mighty question, which can only be decided by comparing great numbers of individuals of an undoubted species, and especially the progeny of a single pair) ; that by constant attention, by saving such as meet his wants and rejecting the 14 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. VI, rest, man has produced very strongly marked varieties, whicli continue "permanent " so long as this care is given, but which, the instant it is relaxed and a free crossins; with other breeds is allowed, show that they are only varieties and not true species by reverting to the original stock. It may also be admitted that in nature a somewhat similar selection takes place, especially under the form of " sexual selection," but there is as yet no evidence whatever that natural species can be compared to the breeds of domesticated animals ; and to ascribe to "selection " of any kind the power of originating species merely because it can preserve useful individual varieties^ is as illogical as — if so homely a simile is allowable — to suppose that the man who is able to manage his own house is, therefore, competent to "keep a hotel." Natural selection may be a true cause, but it is not shown to be a sufficient cause. It may here be noted that reversion is not mentioned in any of the statements of the theory of natural selection by either Dar- win or Wallace. Yet the former treats of the subject at length, and even depends upon its agency, after the lapse of thousands of years, to account for the sudden reappearance of otherwise inex- plicable structures ; so that, if we give to reversion the weight which Darwin himself allows it when it favours his views, his ar- guments against its action (pages 28 and 160) do not remove what is really a very serious objection to the theory of natural selection as applied to the production of specific forms in nature. This whole subject is well presented by Mivart in the chapter on "Specific Stability;" and we have alluded to it here because it has always seemed to us to involve a fundamental fallacy which the author of "Natural Selection" is bound to remove. The object of the "Genesis of Species" is "to maintain the position that natural selection acts, and, indeed, must act; but that still, in order that we may be able to account for the pro- duction of known kinds of animals and plants, it requires to be supplemented by the action of some other natural law or laws, as yet undiscovered" (page 5). This is, we may remark, but one of the numerous evidences that, while the general theory of "derivation" has been steadily gaining adherents even from among its original opponents, yet "natural selection" — Darwin- ism " pure and simple" — has been, and is still, losing ground even with those who were inclined to adopt it. Huxley " adopts it Xo. 1.] THE ORIGIN OP SPECIES. 15 ouly provisionally."* McCoshf admits that • it contains much truth, but not all, and overlooks more than it perceives." Les- ley! says, "All agree that it is true if kept within the regions of variety^ but it is disputed whether it be true for actual sj^ecific differences." Wallace denies its sufficiency in the case of man, and Darwin himself has modified his views somewhat in this last edition of the " Origin of Species;" furthermore, he admits "the existence of difficulties so serious that he can hardly reflect on them without being staggered" (p. 167) ; and that "scarcely a single point is discussed on which facts cannot be adduced oftep apparently leading to conclusions opposite to mine" (p. 18). Indeed, with characteristic candour, he specifies certain ideas which if proved, would be fatal : " If it could be proved that any part of the structure of one species had been formed for the exclusive good of another species, it would annihilate my theory" (p. 196). We may, for example, yet learn the use which the "rattle" and the expanded hood have for the rattlesnake and the cobra, but Mivart is inclined to believe they are rather injurious, since they warn the prey (p. 50). Another such "' fatal idea" is the doc- trine that "many structures have been created for beauty in the eye of man or for mere variety" (p. 194). And here our author seems to contradict himself when, upon the same page, he admits that " many structures are now of no direct use to their posses- sors, and may never have been of any use to their progenitors" — a subject which has been well discussed by the Duke of Argyll. § The theory of natural selection im.plies that all changes are minute and gradual ; and also that only useful structures are preserved and augmented. Prof. Mivart points out the difficulty of explaining the origin of the unsymmetrical form of the floun- ders, etc. (p. 37), of the limbs of animals which, in their earliest and minutest form, must have been mere buds or roughnesses, and thus rather impediments to the progress of our ancient aqua- tic progenitor (p. 39). Darwin further admits that "it is im- possible to conceive by what steps the electric organs of fishes were produced (p. 184), also that the absence of imperfectly organized forms in the lowest strata of the earth's crust is inex- • " Man's Place in Nature," p. 128. t Report of recent lectures. t " Man's Origin and Destiny." § " Roign of Law," seventh edition, p. 230. 16 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. VI. plicable" (p. 292) ; and his explanation of the absence of the transitional forms which must have existed, according to his theory of "minute modifications in time," between such forms as the elephant, the giraffe, the galeopithecus, the bats, and the or- dinary quadrupeds, is very unsatisfactory. His theory of rudi- mentary organs, also, is extremely imperfect. He accounts for all such from the disuse of previous jperfeet organs (p. 408) ; but he nowhere hints at the far more essential question as to how these original organs became perfect ; for upon his own general hypothesis they must have been rudimentary in the beginning. With regret, and after the closest and most sincere examination of all his remarks upon this subject, we confess that we have rarely seen such an absolute lack of logical argument as is evinced in the section upon rudimentary and functionless structures. In fact, the immense amount of evidence which he has collected does not seem to us to bear upon the main point, the origin of sjjecies, at all, but only upon the preservation of favourahle individual variations. We have not space for further presentation of our own difficul- ties or those which others have urged against the theory of natural selection, and will simply quote the general grounds upon which Prof. Mivart has been led, with no prejudice against it, to regard that theory as playing only a subordinate part in the pro- duction of new species (p. 21) : " Natural selection is incompetent to account for the incipient stages of useful structures. It does not harmonize with the co- existence of closely similar structures of diverse origin." " Certain fossil transitional forms are absent which miaht have been expected to be present ; and some facts of geographical dis- tribution supplement other difficulties. There are many remark- able phenomena in organic forms upon which natural selection throws no lio-ht whatever." " Still other objections may be brought against the hypothesis of ' pangenesis'-'^ which, professing as it does to explain great dif- ficulties, seems to do so by presenting others not less great — almost to be the explanation of ohsaunim 2^€r ohscuriusy These difficulties, which are set forth with equal cogency and fairness in the earlier chapters of the " Genesis of Species," have * Propounded at the close of the work upon '• Variation under Domestication." Xo. 1.] THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES. 17 led its author to a view which he alludes to throughout his work, but presents in detail in the chapter entitled " Specific Genesis." ''Accordino- to this view, an internal law presides over the actions of every part of every individual, and of every organism as a unit, and of the entire oriranic world as a whole. It is believed that this conception of an internal innate force will ever remain necessary, however much its subordinate processes and actions may become explicable. That by such a force, from time to time, new species are manifested by ordinary generation, these new forms not bein->; monstrosities, but consistent wholes. That these 'jumps' are considerable in comparison with the minute variations of ' natural selection' — are, in fact, sensible steps, such as discriminate species from species. That the latent tendency which exists to these sudden evolutions is determined to action by the stimulus of external condition." The part assigned to natural selection is stated as follows : " It rigorously destroys monstrosities, favours and develops useful variations, and removes the antecedent species rapidly when the new one evolved is more in harmony with surrounding conditions." Professor Mivart has so frankly admitted the essential coin- cidence of the above view with the one expressed by Professor Owen in 1868,* that we do not hesitate to call his attention to the similar views previously advanced by Professor Parsons, of Harvard University, and by the anonymous author of "Vestiges of Creation;" believing that his own conclusions were reached in entire independence of all of them, as is said of Professor Owen's. The author of the " Vestiges " expresses himself as follows : f " My idea is, that the simplest and most primitive type, under a law to which that of like-production is subordinate, gave birth to the type next above it, that this again produced the next higher, and so on to the very highest, the stages of advance being in all cases veiy small, namely, from one species only to another. Yet in another point of view, the phenomena are wonders of the highest kind, in so far as they are direct effects of an Almighty will, which had provided beforehand that everything should be very good." • " Comp. Anat. and Phys. of Vertebrates," vol. iii. p. 808. t " Vestiffes of the Natural History of Creation," tliird edition, p. 170. Vol. XI. B No. 1, 18 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Yol. vi. Professor Parsons^' writes as follows : '' Suppose the time to have come when there is to be a new creation, and it is to be a dog, or rather two dogs, which shall be the parents of all dogs. How shall they be created ? . . . . The fifth view is, they will be created by some influence of varia- tion acting upon the ova of some animal nearest akin — a wolf, or a fox, or a jackal — and the brood will come forth puppies, and grow up dogs to become dogs." B3sides the above, several other authors (Gray, J Argyll, J and Nealeg) had already hinted at the necessity of admitting the sud- den production of new specific forms, in some cases at least ; and Darwin himself, as we shall see hereafter, appears to have a dim idea that something of the kind might happen in defiance of natural selection. Nothing like direct evidence can be given in support of this theory of '-specific genesis;" but the question really is, as stated by Parsons, whether, as a provisional hypothesis, it is not on the whole, less improbable than any other, and open to fewer objec- tions. Those who, like Spencer, are unwilling to admit the action of any but known physical laws and agencies, may say, and truly, that the supposition of an ''innate internal tendency" only removes the difficulties one step further back, and is at best merely re-stating the case in a general way ; but little more can be said of the theory of gravitation. ON A NEW FOSSIL CRUSTACEAN FI103I THE DEVONIAN EOCKS OF CANADA. Extract from a pai^er in the Geological Marjazine, Vol. 8, No. 3, "ow some new Phyllopodous Crustaceans from the Palaeozoic MucJcs. By Henry Woodward, F.G.S., F.Z.S. Amonost a series of Crustacean remains, from the collection of Prof. Bell, of Canada, obtained in the Middle Devonian of G-asp^, and left with me for examination by the kindness of Principal Dawson, F.R.S., of McGill College, Montreal, is a portion of a * American Journal of Science, July J 1860. t Am. Jovrn. of Science, March, 1860 ; Atlantic Monthly, July, Aug., Oct., 1860. ; " Reign of Law" p. 237. § Froc. Zool. Sac. of London, Jan. 18, 1861. No. 1.] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 19 valve of Bithyrocaris? most beautifully sculptured, of which the following is a description. The specimen is eleven lines in breadth, and probably measured, when entire, nearly two inchcfe in length. The dorsal border is rounded in a corresponding degree with the ventral border ; a small rostrum is observable at the anterior end, from which two prominent ridges also take their rise and pass over the side, one arching towards the dorsal, the other bending towards the ventral line, but uniting again on the centre of the valve at one inch from the anterior end. The fine striae above and below these prominent ridges are parallel, but ' those inclosed in the central elliptical space cross one another so as to form a finely reticulated pattern on its surface. The eye spot is distinct and prominent at the anterior end, near the inter- section of the two curved ridges. Other slight, scarcely visible, folds traverse the carapace parallel to the ventral and dorsal border, indicating that the original shell was of extreme tenuity, like that of the recent Ajnis and Estheria. Should the discovery of other and more perfect specimens prove this to be a true Dithyrocaris, it will be the first specimen of this ccenus met with in rocks of Devonian aire. I had proposed to call this form D. striatus,^ but as there is already a D. tenuisfriatus, it will be better not to give it so in- distinct a name. I therefore beg to name it Dithyrocaris f Belli. after its discoverer. THE POST-PLIOCENE GEOLOGY OF CANADA. By J. W. Dawson, LL.D., F.E.S., F.G.S. Introductori/ . When in 1855 the writer, in consequence of accepting the office of Principal of McGill College, was removed from the Carboniferous Districts of Nova Scotia, and thus to some extent debarred from the prosecution of his researches in the carbonifer- ous rocks of that Province and their fossil plants, he determined, with the advice of Sir W. E. Logan, then Director of the Geo- logical Survey of Canada, to take up as an occasional pursuit the study of the Drift Deposits of Canada, a work which had, at ♦ British Association Reports. Section C, Liverpool, 1870. 20 THE CANADIAN NATUltALIST. [Vol. vL least, this link of connection with previous occupations, that it related in part to marine animals, "with which his Zoological studies on the sea coast had made him familiar. The results of these studies have, in part, been published in the following papers : — (1.) On the Newer Pliocene and Post-Pliocene of the Vicinity of Montreal. — Canadian Naturalist, 1857. (2.) Additional Notes on the Post-Pliocene Deposits of the St. Lawrence Valley. — lb. 1859. (3.) On the climate of Canada in the Post-Pliocene Period. — lb. 1860. (4.) On Post-Tertiary Fossils from Labrador. — lb. 1860. (5.) On the Geology of Murray Bay (Part 3, Post-pliocene deposits) — lb. 1861. (6.) Address as President of the Natural History Society of Montreal.— 76. 1864. (T.) On the Post-pliocene Deposits of Riviere du Loup and Tadoussac, — lb. 1865. (8.) Comparison of the Icebergs of Belle-isle and the Glaciers of Mont Blanc, with reference to the Boulder-clay of Canada.— /Zy. 1866. (9.) On the Evidence of Fossil plants as to the Post-pliocene climate of Canada. — lb. 18(?6. In addition to these papers I placed in the hands of Sir W. E, Logan, all my notes and lists of fossils up to 1863, for his Report of that year ;^^ and gave a resume of the subject, in so far as the Post-pliocene of the Acadian Provinces is concerned, in the second edition of my "Acadian Geology," published in 1868. Much of the matter contained in these detached publications now requires revision, more especially the lists of fossils; and many additional facts have accumulated. I purpose therefore now to summarize the facts and conclusions of my previous papers and to unite them with the new facts, so as to present as complete a view as possible of the geology of the superficial deposits of Can- ada. I shall also prepare a complete list of the fossils up to date, with revised nomenclature and synonymy. In this last part of the work I have been aided by Dr. P. P. Carpenter and Mr. Whiteaves. I have had the benefit, in the case of several critical species, of the advice of Mr. J. G. Jeffreys, and Mr. R. Macxln- * Quoted in this paper as the " Geology of Canada,'' No. 1.] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 21 dreAv of Loudon. I am also indebted to Mr. G. S. Brady for determining the Ostracoda, to the Rev. H. W. Crosskey for op- portunities of comparing specimens with those of the Clyde Beds, and to Prof. T. R. Jones and Dr. Parker and Mr. Gr. M. Dawson for help with the Foraminifera. The present memoir will, I am sure, be welcomed by all who are engaged in the study of the subject to which it relates, if for no other reason, because the Post-pliocene deposits of Canada from their great extent and perfect development, are well fitted to throw light on many of the controversies which are now agi- tated with regard to these deposits. It may be proper here to indicate the nomenclature which will be followed. When the whole oeolooical series is divided into Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary, the deposits to which this paper relates are usually named Post-tertiary or Quaternary. These terms are, in my judgment, unfortunate and misleading. If we take the relations of fossils as our guide, then, as Pictet has well remarked, whether we regard the land or the sea animals, there is no decided break between the Newer Pliocene and the Post-pliocene, the changes not being greater than those between the Pliocene and the older Tertiary ages. There is, therefore, uo such thing in nature as a Quaternary time distinct from the Tertiary, as the Tertiary is distinct from the Secondary. Where therefore the terms Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary are used, the latter should include the whole time from the Eocene to the modsrn, inclusive, unless indeed the advent of man be considered ^ K^\<:v rriassic Trajt. W//M 2Ictaniorpliic Jiocks. No. 1.] BAILEY — GRAND MANAN. 43 ON THE PHYSIOGRAPHY AND GEOLOGY OF THE ISLAND OF GRAND MANAN. By Prof. L. W. Bailey. The Island of Grand Manan, near the entrance of the Bay of Fundy, though so long and so well-known for its picturesque scenery and from the richness of the surrounding waters as a fishing-ground for marine invertebrates, has received compara- tively little attention at the hands of the geologist. Statements bearing more or less directly upon its geological structure have indeed appeared from time to time, but since the date of Dr. Gesner's first exploration of the island (in 1838) no examinations with a special view to the determination of that structure have been made until quite recently. The most discordant views have in consequence been entertained with reference to the age of its rock formations. A visit, of some four days duration, made during the summer of 1870, in pursuance of duties connected with the Geological Survey of Canada, having enabled me to examine a considerable portion of the island and to compare its rocks with those recognized upon the main-land of New Brunswick, I propose to give here some of the conclusions at which I have arrived. The general form of the island of Grand Manan is that of an irregular elongated oval, of which the greater diameter is about fifteen and the shorter about seven miles. Its surface, for pur- poses of description, may conveniently be divided into two distinct regions, contrasted equally in their physical and in their geolo- gical features. Of these the westerly and more extensive tract, embracing more than two-thirds of the main island, has the character of a somewhat elevated plateau, traversed in a direction parallel to its length by a series of minor ridges and depressions, and exposing upon the western shore, which is remarkably uni- form and entirely free from islands, a series of bold bluff's, vary- ing from two to four hundred feet in elevation.^ This plateau is for the most part well wooded (with birch, maple, beech, &c.,) ♦ Among flowering plants observed on the island (August 22nd) were Asters and Solidagots of several species, Scutellaria galericulata^ Potentilla fruticosa^ Campanula rotundifolia^ Epilohium angustifolium^ Sedum rhodiola, &c. 44 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. except near the surfaces of exposed cliffs or upon rocky ledges which are often densely covered with a low growth of Juniper (Juniperus.) The descent from this plateau to the lower lands which form the eastern side of the island, though less abrupt than that just alluded to, is nevertheless everywhere well defined, much of the last named region, including nearly all the settled portions of the island, being commonly not above a height of twenty or thirty feet above tide-level, and often much less.* This side of the island is further contrasted with that which forms its western half in its great irregularity of outline and in the numerous islands, of greater or less size, by which it is bordered. The many harbours which indent this shore afford a safe refuge to those engaged in the pursuit of fishing, an occupation to which the inhabitants of the island are almost solely devoted. The first published observations on the geology of Grand Manan are those of Dr. Gesner, who in his first report to the legislature of New Brunswick (1838) describes at some length its general topographical and mineralogical features. The two reo'ions above contrasted were recosrnized, and described as con- sisting, the one of trap and the other of slates (talcose, hornblen- dic and chloritic) and quartz rock, intersected by trappean dykes ; but beyond an allusion to the resemblance of the first named rocks in general aspect and in the contained minerals to those of Blomidon in Nova Scotia, no attempt at determining the age of either of these formations was made. In the geological map of Dr. Eobb, which was for the most part based upon the observa- tions of Dr. Gesner, the belt of rocks last mentioned is simply indicated as trappean, while those of the eastern coast are colored as of Cambrian age. From this time until the appearance of the second edition of the Acadian Geology of Dr. Dawson, no pub- lished references to the geology of Grand Manan appear to have been made. In an Appendix, however, to the last named work a summary of some observations bearing upon this subject is given by Prof. A. E. Verrill, who, though visiting the island chiefly for zoological purposes, had at the same time been able to devote some attention to its o-eolosrical structure. The formations * An exceiDtion to this low and level character occurs at the north- eastern end of the island, where the large peninsula separating Whale Cove and Flag's Cove is somewhat high and broken. No. 1.] BAILEY — GRAND MANAN. 45 distinguished by Prof. Verrill, and described as being unconform- able, correspond to the two belts recognized by Dr. Gesner, and to which allusion has already been made in describing the physi- cal features of the island. That which forms its eastern side, and which was supposed to be the oldest, was found to consist of talcose and clay slates, mostly grayish, but sometimes black, cal- careous grits, altered grey sandstones, the latter by induration sometimes becoming quartzites, or (when impure) imperfect syenites, and at some points black fissile carbonaceous shales ; — the series, as a whole, being highly altered and disturbed, with numerous immense dykes and masses of trap. The sandstones in one case are described as containing vegetable traces. These rocks were found to occupy not only the belt of low land skirting the eastern border of the main island, but also (as far as examined) the adjacent islands, excepting Inner Wood Island, composed in part of conglomerates and red sandstones, possibly of more recent origin, and the outer of the Three Islands, wherein were found beds of crystalline limestone.''"^ The second series, embracing the trappean belt which forms the western side and the major portion of the main island, is described by Prof. Verrill as consisting of thick-bedded, regularly stratified massive rocks of various composition, but mostly amygdaloidal, trap ash, and com- pact quartzose rocks, the beds being in some places nearly hori- zontal, and in others dipping to the W. or S. W. > 10*^ to 20*^. The traps at some points were found to be columnar, while from the cavities of the amygdaloids were obtained calcite, stilbite, apophyllite and other zeolitic minerals. With regard to the age of the two formations thus distinguished. Prof. Verrill makes no reference to that of the former beyond the statement that it is apparently the older of the two, but offers the conjecture that the latter, judging from the fqypearance of the rocks alone, may be of Devonian age. In commenting on these observations the author of the Acadian Geology thinks it probable that the outer and older series above mentioned may be either the equivalent of the St. John group (Primordial) or of the Kingston series (at that time supposed to be of Upper Silurian age), and that the traps, with some asso- ciated sandstones, might be Devonian or Upper Silurian. In the geological map accompanyinsj this work these formations are re- * Observed also by Dr. Gesner. 46 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vl. presented in accordance with one of these conjectures, the one as of Lower and the other as of Upper Silurian age. That the great belt of trappean rocks which form so marked a feature both in the physical structure and in the geology of Grand Manan, is of much more recent date than is supposed in the above observations, will, I think, with a full knowledge of the facts, scarcely admit of doubt. After a careful examination of a considerable part of their area, both as exposed in the shore cliffs and over the interior, I have no hesitation in re-affirming the comparison, long since made by Dr. Gesner, between these rocks and those of the North Mountains of Nova Scotia. So far as I have had an opportunity of examining the latter, their resem- blance to those of Grand Manan is very striking, as well in their composition as in their general aspect, while both are quite unlike anything met with among the older recognized formations of New Brunswick. These traps at Grand Manan, though largely strati- jfied, have evidently come up through the older metamorphic rocks of the island (which are at some points, as at the Swallow Tail Light, intersected by large dykes of exactly similar character), and were probably contemporaneous with the similar outflows at Blomidon and elsewhere, but whether the period of this eruption is to be assigned to the Triassic or to a still more recent epoch, is as yet undetermined. As tending to confirm the view of the Mesozoic age of these rocks, I was fortunate in being able to examine in situ the sandstones referred to, but not seen by Prof. Verrill, as sometimes occurring with them. These are rarely met with, (at least in that part of the island visited by me) being ex- ceedingly soft and easily worn away except where protected by overlying masses of harder trap. They may, however, be seen near the entrance of Dark Harbor, the principal and almost the only break in the continuity of the western shore, and are said to be exposed at other points as well. In their features of softness and incoherence, as well as in their peculiar light red colour, these sandstones resemble very closely those of the Annapolis and Corn- wallis valleys in Nova Scotia, or those which, at Quaco and else- where on the southern coast of New Brunswick, have been refer- red to the New Bed Sandstone Era.^ * G. F. Matthew — Observations on the Geology of St. John County, N.B. Also, Bailey and Matthew— Observations on the Geology of Southern New Brunswick. No. 1.] BAILEY — GRAND MANAN. 41 Another feature in which these red sandstones resemble those of the province of Nova Scotia, is to be found in their apparent relations to the associated trap. At Dark Harbor the first named rocks form a low terrace along and below the trappean bluffs, which here form an almost precipitous wall of over four hundred feet, and at their outer edge may be seen to dip towards the lat- ter at an angle of about 20^^. The direct superposition of the traps upon the arenaceous beds is not seen at this point, but I am told that further South the line of contact between the two is visible for some distance along the face of the shore-bluffs. * In reference to the nature and composition of the trappean rocks in question, I have little to add to what has already been stated by Dr. Gesner and Prof. Verrill. The best view to be had of their structure is that furnished in the sea-cliffs which inter- vene between Whale Cove and Long Eddy Point, constituting what is known as the Northern Head of Grand Manan. Along the western of the first-named indentation, these cliffs, having a maximum elevation of about 240 feet, may be seen to consist of alternating beds, from five to ten in number and varying from ten to twenty feet in thickness, the thicker beds being composed of a hard grey and greenish compact trap, which is sometimes colum- nar, while the softer intervening beds are amygdaloidal. These amygdaloids vary a good deal in texture as well as in colour, being sometimes fine grained and sometimes coarse, and exhibiting various shades of grey, green, red or purple. Their contained minerals are calcite and the ordinary zeolites, frequently with a considerable admixture of deep green chloritic matter, and more rarely scales of black mica. Native copper is sometimes met with, and considerable masses of this mineral are said to have been found at different times in the superficial drift of the islands. The zeolites are less perfect and in less variety than those of Nova Scotia. Between the head of Whale Cove and Eel Brook the trappean beds form a low synclinal, distinctly visible at a considerable dis- tance from the shore. Northward of this brook, the stratifica- f These red sandstones of Grand Manan in some parts contain considerable quantities of copper ores, which were examined and described by Prof. E. J. Chapman of Toronto in a report with a sec- tion, published in 1869. In this he refers the sandstones with their associated traps to the Triassic or New Red Sandstone period.— Eds. Can. Nat. 48 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. VI. tion is less evident, the high bluffs of the Northern Head (300 to 350 feet) consisting for the most part of columnar trap ; but West- ward of this Head the beddins: is a 20*^), and a breadth of over one-eighth of a mile.^ It rests upon soft dark green shales, and with these extends through the length of the island, reappearing in Grull Rock and in Chalk Cove towards the northern end of Ross Island. This large island, as well as the shore from Wood- ward's Cove to Grand Harbour, I had not leisure to examine, but in passing around the shore of the last named haven, and thence along the beach to Red Head, was enabled to obtain a fair idea of the structure of the remaining portion of the metamor- phic belt. Along the western side of Grand Harbour the strata exposed to view, near its head, are greenish-grey chloritic and grey feld- spathic schists, and grey feldspathic sandstones, with a strong slaty cleavage and variable dip ; while nearer its entrance there are with these fine-grained greenish and purplish rocks, containing epidote, and more or less amygdaloidal. A few beds of fine- grained grey felsite, or felsite with an admixture of quartz and chlorite, or talcoid mica, are intercalated with these. The dip here is N. 60 to 70 E. > 30^ to 50°. Similar beds, but with a larger proportion of shales, sometimes purple and sometimes dark green with films of chlorite, skirt the shore westward of the entrance of the harbour, forming the promontories of Mike's and Oxnard's Points. A long curving beach, broken at intervals by beds of yellowish-grey slaty felsite, separates this point from a line of low bluffs running out and terminating in the promontory of Red Head, The beds exposed in these bluffs bear much re- semblance to some of those described above, as seen upon the shores of Flag's Cove, towards the head of the island. They are grey and bluish-grey (sometimes purple or black) fine-grained beds, conspicuously ribbon-banded and thrown into innumerable sharp corrugations. With these are grey feldspathic sandstones, coated M'ith specular iron, and coarse green chloritic beds, simi- larly plicated, but having a general northerly dip at an angle of about 30°. Towards the head the finer beds predominate, be- coming soft and rubly and conspicuously stained with red oxide * The quartz rock is here associated with dark grey fissile shales and green chloritic schists, dipping S. 40 W. > 30. It has almost the aspect of a white quartz vein. Similar rocks form conspicuous cliff.i on the western side of' Whitehead Island but have not been visited by me. 52 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Yol. vi. of iron J having evidently suggested the name by which the pro- montory is known. The latter, as stated in a preceding para- graph, marks the southern limit of the metamorphic belt, the contact of this with the Mesozoic traps being well exposed in a small cove upon its western side. The red slates last described, dipping northward, here meet and are covered by a coarse con- glomerate made of dark trap pebbles, which in turn underlies and passes into coarsely columnar trap, these being the first of a suc- cession of such beds forming the northern shore of Benson's Cove. Several small groups of islands lie to the south and east of the promontory last described. These I have only partially examined, but as they exhibit some features not met with upon the main- land, they may be briefly alluded to here. The first of these groups is that known as the Wood Islands, distinguished as the Inner and Outer Wood Islands. Upon the former the rocks bear much resemblance to those seen alone; the western side of Grand Harbour, described above. They are rather fine grained rocks, of bright green, red, and purple colours, often diversified with paler bands and blotches, and more or less filled with amygdules of calcite and epidote. These beds are associated with sandstones (and some conglomerates) of deep red and purplish red colours, sometimes finely banded and alternating with thinner beds of pale grey feldspathic schist and impure dolomite. These rocks, with occasional masses of trap, form nearly the whole of the wes- tern side of the island, as well as its northern extremity, their dip being somewhat variable, but where most regular, about N. 20 to 60*^ E. :>► 40*^. The sandstones are at some points very curiously and conspicuously marked by narrow veins (one-fourth of an inch wide) of fibrous calcite or satin spar, which fill short lenticular cavities arranged in parallel and overlapping lines, at right angles to the bedding of the rock. Outer Wood Island, at the only point seen by me (on its eastern side), is composed of hard greenish-grey siiico- feldspathic rocks, with very obscure stratification. The group of the Three Islands lies to the south and east of that last described, and with the exception of Gannet Rock, on which a light-house is built, is the most southerly of the chain of islands about the entrance of the Bay of Fundy. On the larger island of this group, known as Kent's Island, are beds of crystal- line limestone. They are mostly light coloured but mottled with shades of green, grey, or pink, and are rendered impure by a No. 1.] BAILEY — GRAND MANAN. 53 considerable admixture of quartz. The associated rocks are pale grey light weathering feldspathic grits, somewhat granitoid in aspect, grey feldspathic quartzites, and greenish and purplish altered schists, all much broken and disturbed. The other islands in this group I have not examined. With reference to the age of the metamorphic rocks described above, I can only add to the various conjectures already made by other authors. In doing so, however, I may say that I have had the advantage of being able to compare them directly with the formations of the mainland, and thus of arrivins; at a more probable estimate of their true position than is likely to be obtained from the mere study of the rocks themselves. Of the recognized formations in New Brunswick, they bear no resem- blance to either the Laurentian, Primordial, Upper Silurian, or Carboniferous. They are equally unlike the Devonian rocks, so far as these have been clearly determined on palseontological evidence. They do, however, bear much resemblance to an as- semblage of strata met with at various points along the southern coast of the Province as well as in the interior, and to a portion of which a Devonian age has been assigned in earlier publications. The rocks in question, embracing like those of Grand Manan a series of coarse red sediments, grey clay slates, chloritic slates and grits, with some limestones and dolomites, were at some points found to rest upon undoubted Devonian beds, and were for this reason referred to that horizon. It is not yet certain that such is not their age, but a careful study of the district having shewn the existence therein of several great faults and overlaps, it is possible that the beds in question, notwithstanding the super- position referred to, are really much more ancient. If this is the case, there can be no doubt that they are to be looked ujDon as a subordinate division of the great Huronian series, to the other members of which, as recognized in southern New Brunswick, they bear much resemblance. The metamorphic rocks of Grand Manan have been compared by Dr. Dawson (from Prof Yerrill's description) with what has been termed the Kingston series on the mainland of the Province. They differ from these latter in some respects, but as these Kingston rocks are now also believed to be a subdivision of the Huronian system, (and not Upper Silurian, as at one time supposed) this comparison may be taken as an additional argument in support of the view here advocated. Prof. Verrill has suggested that possibly more than one group 54 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. may be represented among tlie metamorphic rocks of Grand Manan. I also incline to this opinion (more particularly as regards the strata first described between Whale Cove and Pette's Cove as compared with those on the coast and islands southward of the latter,) but think that neither will be found to be more recent than the earliest Primordial Silurian. The accompanying map is a copy of the Admiralty chart of Grand Manan, slightly modified to show the position and extent of its geological formations. ON THE OIL-BEARING LIMESTONE OF CHICAGO. By T. Sterry Hunt, LL.D., F.E.S. (Read before the American Association for the Advancement of Science,, at Troy, August, 1870.) When in 1861,^ I first published my views on the petroleum of the AYest, I expressed the opinion that the true source of it was to be looked for in certain limestone formations which had long been known to be oleiferous. I referred to the early ob- servations of Eaton and Hall on the petroleum of the Niagara limestone, to numerous instances of the occurrence of this sub- stance in the Trenton and Corniferous formations and, in Gaspe, in limestones of Lower Helderberg age. Subsequently, in this Journal for March, 1863, and in the Geology of Canada, I insisted still farther upon the oleiferous character of the Corniferous limestone in south-western Ontario, which appears to be the source of the petroleum found in that region. I may here be permitted to recapitulate some of my reasons for conclud- ing that petroleum is indigenous to these limestones, and for rejecting the contrary opinion, held by some geologists, that its occurrence in them is due to infiltration, and that its origin is to be sought in an unexplained process of distillation from pyroschists or so-called bituminous shales. These occur at three distinct horizons in the New York system, and are known as the Utica slate, immediately above the Trenton limestone, and the Mar- cellus and Genesee slates which lie above and below the Hamilton shales, the latter being separated from the underlying Corniferous limestone by the Marcellus slate. * Montreal Gazette, March 1, and this Journal, July, 1861. No. 1.] HUNT— OIL-BEARING LIMESTONE. 55 First, these various pyroschists do not, except in rare instances, contain any petroleum or other form of bitumen. Their capa- bility of yielding volatile liquid hydrocarbons or pyrogenous oils, allied in composition to petroleum, by what is known to chemists as destructive distillation, at elevated temperatures, is a property which they possess in common with wood, peat, lignite, coal, and most substances of organic origin, and has led to their being- called bituminous, although they are not in any proper sense bituminiferous. The distinction is one which will at once be obvious to all those who are familiar with chemistry, and who know that pyroschists are argillaceous rocks containing in a state of admixture a brownish insoluble and infusible hydrocarbonace- ous matter, allied to lignite or to coal.^ Second, the pyroschists of these different formations do not, so far as known, in any part of their geological distribution, whether exposed at the surface or brought up by borings from depths of many hundred feet, present any evidence of having been sub- mitted to the temperature required for the generation of volatile liydrocarbons. On the contrary they still retain the property of yielding such products when exposed to a sufficient heat, at the same time undergoing a charring process by which their brown colour is changed to black. In other words these pyroschists have not yet undergone the process of destructive distillation. Third, the conditions which the oil occurs in the limestones, are inconsistent with the notion that it has been introduced into these rocks by distillation. The only probable or conceivable source of heat, in the circumstances, being from beneath, the process of distillation would naturally be one of ascension, the more so as the pores of the underlying strata would be filled with water. Such being the case, the petroleum of the Upper Silurian and Lower Devonian limestones must have been derived from the Utica slate beneath. This rock, however, is ualtered, and more- over, the intermediate sandstones and shales of the Loraiue, Me- dina and Clinton formations, are destitute of petroleum, which must, on this hypothesis, have passed through all these strata to condense in the Niagara and Corniferous limestones. More than this, the Trenton limestone which, on Lake Huron and elsewhere, has yielded considerable quantities of petroleum, has no pyroschists beneath it, but on Lake Huron rests on ancient crystalline rocks, * Silliman's Journal, II, xxxv, 159-lGl. 56 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. with the iutervention only of a sterile sandstone. The rock-for- mations holding petroleum are not only separated from each other by great thicknesses of porous strata destitute of it, but the dis- tribution of this substance is still farther localized, as I many years since pointed out. The petroleum is in fact in many cases, confined to certain bands or layers in the limestone, in which it fills the pores and the cavities of fossil shells and corals, while other portions of the limestone, both above, below, and in the prolongation of the same stratum, though equally porous, contain no petroleum. From all these facts the only reasonable conclu- sion seems to me to be that the petroleum, or rather the materials from which it has been formed, existed in these limestone rocks from the time of their first deposition. The view which I put forward in 1861, that petroleum and similar bitumen have re- sulted ftom a peculiar " transformation of vegetable matters, or in some cases of animal tissues analogous to those in composition," has received additional support from the observations of Lesley,^ in West Virginia and Kentucky, and from the more recent ones of Peckham.f The objection to this view of the origin and geological relations of petroleum, have been for the most part founded on incorrect notions of the geological structure of southwestern Ontario, which has afforded me peculiar facilities for studying the question. In this region, it has been maintained by Winchell that the source of the petroleum is to be sought in the Devonian pyroschists. I however showed in 1866, as the result of careful studies of the various borimrs : first, that none of the oil-wells were sunk in the Genesee slates, but along denuded anticlinals where these rocks have disappeared, and where, except the thin layer of Marcellus slate sometimes met with at the base of the Hamilton shales, no pyroschists are found above the Trenton limestone. Second, that the reservoirs of petroleum in the wells sunk into the Hamilton shales are sometimes met with in this formation, and sometimes, in adjacent borings, only in the underlying Corniferous. Examples of this have been cited by me in wells in Enniskillen, Bothwell, Chatham, and Thamesville, where petroleum has first been found at depths of from thirty to one hundred and twenty feet in the * Rep. Geol. Canada, 1866, 240 ; and Proc. Amer. Philos. Soc. x, 33, 187. t Ibid, X, 445. No. 1.] HUNT — OIL-BEARING LIMESTONE. 51 Corniferous limestone, in all of these places overlaid by the Ha- milton shales. It was also shown, that in two localities in this region, viz. in Tilsonburg and at Maidstone, where the Cornifer- ous is covered only by quaternary clays, petroleum in considerable quantities has been obtained by sinking into the limestone.^ That the supplies are less abundant than in parts where a mass of shales and sandstones overlies the oil bearing limestone is ex- plained by the fact that both the pores and the fissures in the superior strata serve to retain the oil, in a manner analogous to the quaternary gravels in some parts of this region, which are the sources of the so-called surface oil-wells. It is therefore not surprising that examples of pyroschists impregnated with oil should sometimes occur, but the evidence of the existence of in- digenous petroleum, which is so clear in the various limestones, is wanting in the case of the pyroschists ; although concretions hold- ing petroleum have been observed in the Marcellus and the Genesee slates of New York. There is, however, reason to believe, as I have elsewhere pointed out, that much of the petro- leum of Pennsylvania, Ohio and the adjacent regions, is indigen- ous to certain sandbtone strata in the Devonian and Carboniferous rocks. f At the meetinc; of the x\merican Association for the Advance- ment of Science at Chicago, in August, 18G8, in a discussion which followed the reading of a paper by myself on the geology of Ontario, J it was contended that, although the various lime- stones which have mentioned are truly oleiferous, the quantity of petroleum which they contain is too inconsiderable to account for the great supplies furnished by oil-producing districts, like that of Ontario for example. This opinion being contrary to that which I had always entertained, I resolved to submit to examin- ation the well-known oil-bearinci; limestone of Chicacco. This limestone, the quarries of which are in the immediate vicinity of the city, is so filled with petroleum that blocks of it which have been used in buildings are discoloured by the exuda- tions, which mingled with dust, form a tarry coating upon the exposed surfaces. The thickness of the oil-bearing beds, which * Silliman's Journal II, xlvi, 360 ; and Report Gcol. Canada. 1866, pp. 241-250. t Ibid, 240. X Silliman's Jour. II, xlvi, 355. 58 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. are massive and horizontal, is, according to Prof. Worthen, from thirt^^-five to forty feet, and they occupy a position about mid- way in the Niagara formation, which has in this region a thick- ness of from 200 to 250 feet. As exposed in the quarry, the whole rock seems pretty uniformly saturated with petroleum, which exudes from the natural joints and the fractured surfaces, and covers small pools of water in the depressions of the quarry. I selected numerous specimens of the rocks from different points and at various levels, with a view of getting an average sample, although it was evident that they had already lost a portion of their original content of petroleum. After lying for more than a year in my laboratory they were submitted to chemical examin- ation. The rock, though porous and discoloured by petroleum, is, when freed from this substance, a nearly white, granular, crys- talline and very pure dolomite, yielding 54*6 p. c. of carbonate of lime. Two separate portions, each made up of fragments obtained by breaking up some pounds of the specimens above mentioned, and supposed to represent an average of the rock exposed in the quarry, were reduced to coarse powder in an iron mortar. Of these two portions, respectively, 100 and 138 grammes were taken, and were dissolved in warm dilute hydrochloric acid. The tarry residue which remained in each case, was carefully collected and treated with ether, in which it was readily soluble with the exception of a small residue. This, in one of the samples, was found equal to -40 p. c, of which -13 was volatilized by heat with the production of a combustible vapour having a fatty odour ; the remainder was silicious. The brown etherial solutions were evaporated, and the residuum freed from water and dried at lOO'^C, weighed in the two experiments equal to 1-570 and 1-505 per cent, of the rock, or a mean of 1-537. It was a viscid red- dish-brown oil, which, though deprived of its more volatile por- tions, still retained somewhat of the odour of petroleum which is so marked in the rock. Its specific gravity as determined by that of a mixture of alcohol and water, in which the globules of the petroleum remained suspended, was -935 at 16'*'C. Estimat- ing the density of the somewhat porous dolomite at 2-600, we have the equation -935 : 2-600 : : 1-1537 : 4-26; so that the volume of the petroleum obtained equalled 4-26 per cent of the rock. This result is evidently too low for two reasons ; first, because the rock had already lost a part of its oil, while in the No. 1.] HUNT — OIL-BEARING LIMESTONE. 59 quarry, and subsequently, before its examination ; and secondly, because the more volatile portions had been dissipated in the process of extraction just described. In assuming 100-00 parts of the rock to hold 4*25 parts by volume of petroleum, we are thus below the truth in the following calculations. A layer of this oleiferous dolomite one mile (5280 feet) square, and one foot in thickness will contain 1,184,832 cubic feet of petroleum, equal to 8,850,069 gallons of 231 cubic inches, and to 221-247 barrels of forty gallons each. Taking the minimum thickness of thirty- five feet, assigned by Mr. Worthen to the oil-bearing rock at Chicago, we shall have in each square mile of it 7,743,745 barrels, or in round numbers seven and three quarter millions of barrels of petroleum. The total produce of the great Pennsylvania oil-region for the ten years from 1860 to 1870 is estimated at twenty-eight millions of barrels of petro- leum, or less than would be contained in four square miles of the oil-bearin2; limestone band of Chicao-o. It is not here the place to insist upon the geological conditions which favour the liberation of a portion of the oil from such rocks, and its accumulation in fissures along certain anticlinal lines in the broken and uplifted strata. These points in the geological history of petroleum were shown by me in my first publications already referred to, March and July, 1861, and indejDendently, about the same time, by Prof. E. B. Andrews in this Journal for July, 1861.^'^ The proportion of petroleum in the rock of Chicago may be exceptionally large, but the oleiferous character of great thick- ness of rock in other regions is well established, and it will be seen from the above calculations that a very small proportion of the oil thus distributed would, when accumulated along lines of uplift in the strata, be more than adequate to the supply of all the petroleum wells known in the regions where these oil-bearing rocks are found. With such sources existing ready formed in the earth's crust, it seems to me, to say the least, unphilosophical to seach elsewhere for the origin of petroleum, and to imagine it to be derived by some unexplained process from rocks which are destitute of the substance. * Sill. Jour. II, xxxii, 85. See also papers on the subject by him and by Prof. Evans, Ibid. II, xl. 33, 334 ; and one by the author, II, XXXV, 170 ; also Report Geol. Survey of Canada, 1866, pp. 256-257. 60 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF CANADx\. Alfred K. C. Selwyn, Director. The Report of Progress from 1866 to 1869 is a bulky volume of 475 pages, with five maps, containing the results of a large amount of work ranging over the whole vast territory from Lake Superior to Nova Scotia inclusive. It embraces the following documents : 1. Letter of Mr. Selwyn introducing the Report. 2. Report of Sir W. E. Logan on part of the Coal-field of Pictou, Nova Scotia. 3. Report of Mr. Edward Hartley on part of the same Coal- field. 4. Report of Mr. R. Bell on the Manitoulin Islands. 5. Report of Mr. James Richardson on the South Shore below Quebec. 6. Report of Mr. Henry G. Vennor on Hastings County, Ontario. 7. Report of Mr. Charles Robb on part of New Brunswick. 8. Report of Dr. T. Sterry Hunt on the Goderich Salt Re- gion, and on Iron and Iron Ores. 9. Report of Mr. James Richardson on the North Shore of the Lower St. Lawrence. 10. Report of Mr. Robert Bell on Lakes Superior and Nipi- gon. 11. Reports of Mr. Edward Hartley on the Coals of Nova Scotia. 12. An Appendix, containing lists of Plants by Dr. John Bell, and a Note on the Nipigon Region by Sir W. E. Logan. Out of such a mass of matter it would be almost in vain to attempt to select specimens of each of the separate treaties of which the Report consists. A melancholy interest attaches to that part of it which bears the name of Mr. Edward Hartley, a young man of great ability and information, and high promise, and whose work in this Report would alone be sufficient to give him a permanent place among our scientific men, but who was cut off by death in the midst of his practical and useful labours. From his elaborate survey of part of the great Pictou coal-field, we may extract the part having reference to areas, in which Ca- nadian capitalists are largely interested : No. 1.] GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OP CANADA. 61 " The Acadia Coal Company own tliree mining rights, which are as follows : The Fraser area, south of the General Mining Association's area; the Carmichael area, southwest of the General Mining Association's area; and No. 3 area, Ij'ing to the south of the Fraser area. ERASER AREA. Workings have been carried on for many years upon the Fraser area ; first by the General Mining Association, and more lately by Mr. J. D. B. Fraser, of Pictou, from whose possession it passed by lease to the present company. Attempts have been made by former owners to work the Deep Seam on the western portion of the area at the McKenzie pit, and a slope has also been driven some distance on the crop of the Third coal seam, both of which workings are now abandoned, and therefore require no special description. The present workings are confined to the McGregor seam and two openings on the Oil- coal. McGregor Colliery. In the McGregor colliery the openings consist of No. 1, an adit, No. 2, a slope, and No. 3, a pair of slopes. Adit No. 1 was opened by the General Mining Association on the left bank of Coal Brook, near the crossing of the Middle Biver road, and driven N. W. a distance of about 800 yards. The seam was irregularly worked by the General Mining Asso- ciation and Mr. Fraser, but is, I believe, for the present aban- doned. Slope No. 2 is a single slope to the lower level of No. 3 slopes, and was formerly the working slope, but is now used only as a travelling way. It stands on the left bank of Coal Brook near the mouth of No. 1. Slopes No. 3 are the principal working. Their situation is 170 yards S. E. of No. 2, on the right bank of the brook. Their total depth is 510 feet. Main levels extend 260 yards N. W. and but 20 yards in the contrary direction. The dimensions of the slope are : Drawing slope (a double rail- way track) 9 feet post, 9 feet cap and 14 feet ground sill. The tracks are all of T iron 25 lbs. to the yard. The second slope, a travelling way for horses and men, is separated from the draw- 62 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. ing slope by a 14 feet barrier of coal ; its height is the same as that of the drawing slope, with 6 feet cap and 8 feet ground sill. A temporary engine is of 14 nominal English horse-power, with a horizontal single cylinder, driving the hoisting drum by shaft- ing with clutch gearing; and also pumping through the Fleming pump pit by a wire rope running over sheave pullies to the pump bob. In working the McGregor seam the upper coal (included in the upper six feet of the seam) is the only portion taken out, the lower bench being unsaleable. The seam is found to rapidly improve going west, as will be seen from the following sections : McGregor seanij upper coal. At No. 2 slope. At western face. Ft. In. Ft. In. Good coal 19 2 9 Arenaceous fire-clay parting. . 10 0 6 Good coal 3 0 4 0 5 9 7 3 Near the western face, the bord and pillar system with incline gate roads has been commenced. Elsewhere in the working the back -balance system is used. Oil-coal WorJcings, Two slopes have been sunk upon the oil-coal seam, namely the Fraser mine on Coal Brook, near No. 3 slopes, and the Stellar mine on McCulloch's Brook. The principal value of this seam consists in the large quantity of oil contained in the bench men- tioned as oil-coal in the general section, which in former years was extensively worked, the oil-coal or steUarite, as it has been named by Professor Henry How, who first described it, selling for a high price for gas-making and distillation. The present low price of coal- oil from the extensive working of petroleum in this country and the United States, combined with the high tarifi" on imported coal imposed by the United States, have com- bined to render the working of this seam unprofitable, and both workings are for the present abandoned. As the quality of this peculiar coal will receive especial atten- tion in the Appendix to this report, I will merely state in conclu- sion that from the large content of oil this seam must at some time prove of considerable value. From pits sunk by the Acadia Coal Company it would appear that the size and quality of the No. 1.] GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF CANADA. 63 Oil-coal bench improves towards the east, the greatest thickness (1 foot 10 inches) being procured in a pit sunk at the corner of Grove street and Pennsylvania avenue in Acadia village, which coal produced 120 gallons of crude oil to the ton; the average obtained from the Fraser mine being about from GO to 65 gallons per ton. CARMICHAEL AREA. For many years no workable coal was known to exist to the west of the McCulloch -brook fault, on which the Albion coal seams are lost ; and though many attempts were made to ascer- tain the position of these seams no coal was found until the 18th April, 1865, when Mr. Truman French, in prospecting for the Nova Scotia Coal Company, discovered the fine seam of coal now known as the Acadia seam, and presumed to be equivalent to the Main seam of the Albion mines. The first opening of this seam was on the area under consideration, near its western boundary, from which point it was traced north and south, as described in treating the general distribution of the coal seams. Acadia Colliery, The Acadia colliery, locally known as the Acadia west slope^ is situated near the south-western corner of the Carmichael area, and within the village of "Westville. Two slopes, corresponding in dimensions to the No. 3 McGregor slopes, have been sunk on the Acadia seam to a depth of about 140 yards from the crop. The section of this seam and the strata immediately overlying, as measured in the air shaft of this colliery, is as follows : Ft. In. Brown carbonaceous shale 4 6 Black bituminous oil shale 0 7 Brown carbonaceous shale 6 6 Ft. In. Good coal, (1st bench) ^^^^ ^^^^ 2 9 Good coal, (2nd bench) / ' 3 6 Light arenaceous fireclay or holing 0 3 Good coal (3rd bench) Coarse hard coal with iron pyrites, easily separated by dressing from the other coals Good coal (4th bench) Coarse coal of fair quality Coarse coal not taken out y Bench coal 3 8 0 1 3 3 2 4 2 4 18 2 29 9 64 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. Above tlie section given, no details for a column of strata can be procured, no record having been preserved of the numerous pits in the overlying measures. The remains from these pits, however, will enable me to state that at this colliery the seam is overlaid with a great mass of barren measures, consisting of black and brown carbonaceous and argillaceous shales, with occasional bands of dark arenaceous shale, and at least two thin bands of thinly laminated sandstones of a general white colour, with black partings, as in the sandstones described in the Foster pit section. Under the seam there is a yellowish-drab Stig^iiaria underclay of at least four feet in thickness. The measures are then concealed for forty -two feet, at which point a heavy bedded sandstone ap- pears, of a light brownish-drab colour, containing, where exposed in a quarry near the Acadia slope, large Stigniaria roots well preserved, as well as occasional stems of Lepidodendron. At this colliery the seam has been proved to be without fault, by the main level, which now extends about 500 yards south and 400 yards north, the exact direction across the area being N. 41° W., (or N. 18° W. magnetic) corresponding to the dip of the seam, N. 49° E. (or N. 72° E. magnetic), which varies only in inclination, being 19° at the surface and about 23° at the lowest level. The under-ground workings are on the counter-balance system, and are remarkably regular and well laid out. Counter- balances are driven 15 feet wide and 100 yards apart, throughout the workings. An air course 8 feet wide is also driven up at 10 yards to the left of each counterbalance. Working bords are 15 feet in width, with 15 feet of pillar, 75 feet of barrier being left above the main level. Machinery. The platforms at the head of the slope are roofed in. They extend from the mouth of the slope to the banks, and also to the shutes over the railway track. At this mine the fine slack is not sold, being carefully screened out, the rest of the coal being- divided into two sizes, round and chesnut. The drawing engines were built in New York, and are fair specimens of the best type of American engines, being compact and easily handled, with none of the slightness of design usually observable in American machinery. They are horizontal high-pressure connected engines, 16 by 48 inch cylinders, working by a 24-inch pinion into a 16- feet spur-wheel on a 14-feet drum. The engine house is of brick No. 1.] GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF CANADA. 65 and cut stone, with a corrugated iron roof. Pumping is effected by a small donkey engine, which is also arranged to hoist bank coal to the screening platform, the quantity of water in this mine being so insignificant that a two-inch column-pipe is sufficient to deliver it. Second Seam, The discovery of the Acadia seam was followed by the discovery of a second seam, underlying at about 160 feet, by Capt. Blacker of the Acadia colliery. At the pit sunk by him the following thickness was found : Ft. In. Slialy coal 3 10 Good coal 7 8 11 6 The bench known as good coal seems, from the specimens I have seen, to be of a shaly character, and none that has come before me would be saleable. On the Carmichael area this is opened by only one trial-pit, now filled up. AREA NO. 3. Upon the No. 3 Acadia area no coal has been found, but from the presence, as proved by trial-pits, of the black shales overlying the Main seam, it is probable that the representatives of this and underlying seams occur beneath a portion of this area to the west of the McCulloch-brook fault. Of the size or character of the coal no information can be obtained without extensive prospecting. The only opening which is near this area is the Culton adit, and from the strike of the Culton seam at that point, it may be pre- sumed that it will continue on to No. 3 area. Railway. The Acadia Coal Company have built a fine single-track rail- way of about three and a-half miles in length, the main line ex- tending from the west slope to the track of the government railway at a point near Coal Mines station, and passing through the Acadia village near the McGregor colliery, with which it is con- nected by sidings. From the junction at the railway station the coal is conveyed over the government railway to the Acadia loading ground at Fisher's Grant, on the east side of Pictou har- bour, near the entrance. The shipping wharf extends into the Vol. VI. B No. 1. 66 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Yol. vi. harbour 850 feet to 26 feet of water at low tide. It is a well- built structure, 20 feet in height, with shutes at both sides and end, empty trains being made up on a centre track. Buildings. Thirty double houses have been provided for miners and la- bourers at the Acadia village, which is very tastefully laid out in regular streets and avenues, the houses being very substantially built, and of a much better class than it is usual to provide for like purposes. The rest of the plant at both slopes, including the blacksmith and machine shops, office building and overmen's houses, is very complete. INTERCOLONIAL COAL MINING COMPANY OF MONTREAL. Two mining areas are owned by this company, the Bear Creek area to the south of the Carmichael area of the Acadia Coal Company, and the Sutherland area, which lies to the north of the area of the General Mining Association. BEAR CREEK AREA. The Acadia seam was opened upon this area soon after its dis- covery in 1865, at a point known as Campbell's pit, near the north line of the area, and from this pit, as worked by the then owners of the area, and subsequently by the agents of this com- pany, a considerable amount of coal was taken for consumption in the immediate neighbourhood. After a careful survey by Mr. William Barnes of Halifax, a competent mining engineer (which survey will again be alluded to) the company decided upon the location of the present colliery. Drummond Colliery. The erection of buildings and machinery at this colliery and the first work at the present slopes was commenced about Novem- ber 1867, since which time works of considerable importance have been erected, a railway has been built, and a large amount of coal (about 70,000 tons) has been shipped. The section of the Acadia seam at this point is as follows, the measurement being taken in the air shaft of the colliery : No. 1.] GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF CANADA. 67 Ft. In. Good coal with a smooth parting two feet nine inches from the bottom, (^fuU coal) 5 9 Light gray soft fireclay ; it varies slightly in thickness ; (holing) 0 3 Good coal, top bench 1 5 6 Gray hard coal, giving a pink ash. [ 0 6 Good coal, second bench Coarse coal, not worked )■ 4 6 2 1 18 7' Underground Worhings. The present workings consist of two working slopes driven about 900 feet from the crop of the seam, the dip being about 16^ at the surface, decreasing to 14^ at the lower level, at 730 feet from the surface. The size of these slopes is 9 by 9 feet, with a central barrier of coal between them of 28 feet, each slope having a single track and travelling-way. Main levels for two lifts have been driven from the slopes north and south upon the seam, the north levels being worked from No. 1 slope and the south from No. 2 ; thus far I believe the lower levels have been most extensively worked, a considerable amount of coal being left near the crop for safety. I have not had an opportunity of ex- amining a detailed plan of the workings, but my inspection of them would lead me to believe that the system of pillarage is planned with more than usual regard for safety. Both the post and stall and counterbalance systems of getting the coal were at first tried with a view of ascertaining their comparative economy, and I believe that Mr. Dunn has selected the counterbalance system for the future working of the mine. But little water has as yet been met with, and it is at present raised by water cars, no pump having been found necessary. Over-ground Works, The arrangements at the surface seem exceptionally well plan- ned and have given great satisfaction. At the head of the slopes a large heapstead or covered screening platform is erected for the separation of different sizes and qualities of coal, and for banking- out. The coal boxes are drawn on to this platform in trams of from five to twelve (holding from 500 to GOO pounds each) and thence delivered by dumps on to the screens, where the coal is separated, as at the Acadia colliery, into three sizes : round coal, 68 THE CANADtAM NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. nut coal and slack. The platform extends over eight railway tracks, four for each slope ; its floor is level with the top of the bank, for banking out, and in shipping bank-coal a railway track is run along the foot of the bank, and from this level the bank cars are raised to the main platform in a cage lifted by a small donkey engine, which is also arranged to drive a circular saw for the car shop of the colliery. The drawing engines are horizontal connected engines of about 50 nominal English horse-power ; they are of Scotch manufac- ture, and are fitted with an extremely ingenious arrangement of friction gearing, by means of which the two slopes may be worked independently, by one engine, a matter of great convenience. Railway. The railway of this company extends from the Drummond colliery to their shipping wharf at Granton on the Middle River, near Abercrombie Point, the position of which will be seen on a map. The main line of single track railway is laid with 56. pound rails, with the new steel scabbard joint, which has proved so successful on the Pictou and Truro branch of the Nova Scotia railway. This railway was built in 1868 by Mr. Joseph B. Moore, contractor, in the most complete manner, the track being well ballasted with broken sandstone and a coarse conglomerate from the cuttings near Waters's Brook, the culverts of cut stone, and the bridge of trestlework with cut stone foundations. The rolling stock of this railway consists of three locomotives, miscellaneous platform and construction cars, and sixty new coal waggons carrying from six to seven tons of round coal each, twenty of which were built at the Drummond colliery car shop. In con- nection with the railway are provided at the colliery, car shops, locomotive-sheds and weigh-houses. The length of the main line of railway from the colliery to the wharf is about seven and one quarter miles, which, with sidings, turn outs and standing tracks at the colliery, will probably raise the total length of single track to about ten miles. The shipping wharf of the Intercolonial Coal Company is a fine structure of wood upon stone and crib work piers, extending in a curve into the channel of the Middle Biver to about 22 feet of water. The arrangement at the platform of the wharf is such that there is a slight incline of one track downward from the shore to the end of the wharf, and thence a further down grade 1^0. 1.] GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OP CANADA. 69 ~ 7 7 7 was educated at the Edinburgh High School. He was intended for the medical profession, but after a time he gave up the course of study which he was pursuing for this purpose, and learned the art of engraving, which was subsequently turned to such good account. But his early predilection for geographical studies having increased with his years, and being animated with a strong desire to accomplit«h something better than had hitherto been attempted in his own country, he determined to make geography his profession, and to devote his whole energies to the prosecution of the absorbing pursuit on which he resolved to enter. Dr. Johnston's first great work was his ' National Atlas,' in folio, which was published, after five years' incessant labour, in 1843. Most of the maps were projected and drawn by himself, and nearly all the names written with his own hand. This work went through many editions, and secured for the author the appoint- ment of Geographer-Royal for Scotland. Humboldt having ex- pressed a wish for an English Physical Atlas, Dr. Johnston resolved to construct one on the scale required. He visited Ger. many in 1842, for the purpose of collecting materials and making other necessary arrangements, and on his return he laid his plans before the Secretary of the Royal Geographical Society. At that period physical geography was scarcely taught in any of our schools ; hence there was but little prospect of any early pecuniary return for the immense labour which would have to be bestowed on such a work as that in contemplation. But these were pre- No. 1.] MISCELLANEOUS. 123 cisely the circumstances under which Dr. Johnston would be likely to distinguish himself. His own passionate devotion to geographical science induced the determination to make the study take its place among the necessary branches of a liberal educa- tion. He received the warmest encouragement from the Koyal Geographical Society, from Karl Eitter, and from Humboldt, — a special interview with the latter having taken place in Paris in Paris in 1845, on the subject of the Physical Atlas ; while the former geographer explained the original merits of the work at a meeting of the Geographical Society of Paris. This Atlas was at first intended to be founded mainly on the great work of Berg- haus : but, as its construction proceeded, the number of additions and improvements that were found necessary caused the abandon- ment of this intention, and Dr. Johnston's Atlas became essen- tially an original work. It was published in 1848, and was wel- comed by all competent authorities, not only because it was a valuable contribution to the study of physical geography, but because it embodied within convenient limits the results which had been secured by the observations of numerous scientific tra- vellers on the geology, meteorology, climatology, and hydrography of the globe. The Geographical Society of Berlin having awarded its Honorary Diploma to Dr. Johnston, Karl Bitter, the Presi- dent, took the opportunity of once more acknowledging the merits of the Atlas. Berlin was not alone in determining to do honour to the great geographer. The Boyal Society of Edinburgh spon- taneously conferred on him the honours and privileges of Fellow- ship; while the leading Geographical Societies of Europe, America, and India, elected him to Honorary and Corresponding Fellowships. The University of Edinburgh also, after the lapse of years, gave him, in 1865, the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws — the highest honour of the kind that the University could bestow. In 1855 he commenced his ' Boyal Atlas of Modern Geography,' in which he may be said to have embodied the results of the arduous studies which he had prosecuted for a quarter of a century. The late Prince Consort took a deep inte- rest in this splendid work, the progress of which he carefully watched, and every sheet of which he criticised as it came out. During recent years Dr. Johnston devoted himself mainly to the publication of maps and other works for educational purposes, and to bringing the results of his previous labours before the public in comparatively cheap forms. — Condensed from The Athe- nceum. 124 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY. The annual meeting of the Society was held at its rooms on May 19th, the President, Principal Dawson, LL.D., F.R.S.. in the chair. Mr. J, F. Whiteaves, the Recording Secretary, read the minutes, after which the President delivered the annual address. The Chairman of the Council, Mr. O. L. Marler, then read his report, of which the following is an abstract : — The Council in making its report for the past year, does so with feelings both of pleasure and regret; with pleasure in having to acknowledge the many valuable scientific contributions which have been placed on the Society's records, to which the President has already alluded ; and with regret that the Society has lost many of its members, the number of which is becoming less every year. This decrease is to be attributed to various causes, chiefly, however, to the fact, that the Committee wiiose special duty it is to solicit and canvas for new members, has ceased its exertions, and that the work of the Society and its valuable contributions to science are not so generally known as they should be. During the last year the Society has lost by death, resignation, or removal, nineteeen members. Eiuht new ones have been added; the net loss on the year is thus eleven. An appeal should therefore be made to the present subscribers to induce their friends to join the Society. Your Council begs leave to suggest one means whereby its sphere of usefulness would be enlarged, to wit, by aflSliating other Societies, and by bringing into one place the different Libraries now existing in this city. The Society should especially urge upon the Trustees of the Eraser Institute the advantages that would accrue to both parties by such an affiliation. Not only is the position of your building most excellent, but the vacant ground adjoiniiig, belonging to the McGill College, also makes the idea very practicable; and although affiliated the institutions would be distinct. The annual Conversazione again failed to draw as many per- sons as we could have wished, notwithstandinii; the exertions of the Committee in whose hands the matter had been left. Yet your Council cannot but think that such reunions have a beneficial tendency, that much Vi'Juable knowledge is derived from them, Isfo. 1.] ifATtRAL HISt6nY SOCIETY. 12 *> and that even though there be a loss in a pecuniary point of view, we must resjard them as affording- valuable knowledj^e of things and objects which would be otherwise unknown. Your Council, therefore, recommend that they be continued. The Council desires to draw the attention of members to the collection of shells belonging to 3Ir. Whiteaves, your industrious Curator, which he is now engaged in classifying ; they are so admir- ably arranged that their inspection will be useful and interesting to members of the Society and to students. Thanks are due Mr. Whiteaves for the duplicates of the collection which he has kindly presented to the 3Iuseum. Your Council have to report that the post of Taxidermist and Janitor, left open by the resignation of the late Mr. Hunter, whom the Society had some difficulty in replacing, has been well and efficiently filled by 3Ir. Passmore. Mr. Whiteaves also read his report as Scientific Curator, of which the followino: is an abstract : — Owing to the protracted ill health of our late deeply rco-retted taxidermist, it was found that moths were makin"- havoc amono* the birds and mammals. The case beins: ur2:ent, 3Ir. Crai^- was called in, and we did our best to remedy the evil. On Mr. Pass- more's arrival, I called his attention to this circumstance, and he lost no time in making a searching examination into all the cases, and did all that could be done in the way of applying" the necessary remedies. Mr. Passmore and myself have also studied closely our series of Canadian birds, have weeded out several specimens which we have good reason to suppose are not American examples at all, and have rectified some errors in the previous nomenclature. The series is now in good order, and none but authentic specimens are included in that part of the collection. In the department of mammalia but one new species has been added, namely, a noble example of the grizzly bear of the Rocky Mountains. In ornithology, however, we have made much more progress. Mr. A. Jowitt has given us thirty-nine specimens of English birds, Major G. E. Bulger seven rare exotic species, but we have only added twelve specimens to our collection of Canadian birds. We have not to go far for a reason for this. When Mr. Passmore arrived, ornithologists here thought that we now had another 126 THE CA?;rADlAN NATtlRALIST. [Vol. VI. active and able naturalist resident on the premises, our collection of birds and mammals would rapidly increase. A special appli- cation was made to the Minister of AsTriculture of the Province of Quebec for a license to enable Mr. Passmore to procure birds, for the museum, which was not granted, probably owing to a mis- apprehension. From the Smithsonian Institute at Washinirton we have received a large and valuable series of North American birds' eggs, con- sisting of ninety-one species, many of them of considerable rarity. Among the more interesting^ of these are the ea'o-s of the Golden eagle, American pelican, King eider and Pacific eider duck, Velvet duck and Surf Scoter, Canvas-backed and Red-headed ducks, Gambel's and Hutchins' geese, Pacific diver. Western grebe, American oyster catcher, California gull, and other rare eggs from xirctic America and the Pacific coast. We have also added Canadian examples of the eggs of the Eed-shouldered buzzard (Buteo lineatus), and of the Long-eared owl (^Otus Wihonianus) to our collection. A description of the nidification of "each of these species, and a list of all the rare birds that have been recently obtained in the Provinee (at least of all those of which I could get any definite information) has been published in The Naturalist. The birds' eggs received during the past year have been labelled and arranged in drawers in the museum. Major Bulger has presented a miscellaneous collection of objects of interest, mostly from the East Indies; a detailed catalogue of some of which has been published in the Society's Journal. Thirty-six species of fossils, several corals, and an example of the Glass-rope sponge {Hyalonema Sieholdii'), have been also added to the Museum. Many of these were received in exchange for shells dredged in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. I have steadily worked at the preparation of my own private collection of shells and fossils for exhibition in the Museum, with the following general results : about 3000 species have been par- tially grouped, of which about 1000 have been attached to proper tablets. Where a name has been ascertained with tolerable cer- tainty, a pen and ink label on white paper has been permanently attached, but where the identification is doubtful, the name and locality of the species is only written in pencil on the blue tablet. Of those mounted permanently 411 species are marine gasteropods (univalve), 300 species and upwards are land or fresh-water gasteropods, 324 species are lamellibranchiate bivalves ;— I esti- No. 1.] NATURAL msTORY SOCIETY. I2t mate those remaining unmounted at about 2500 species. With regard to the scientific arrangement to be ultimately adopted, there are some difficulties in the way. Dr. Woodward's manual, though excellent as far as it goes, represents only the state of our knowledge of the subject some fifteen or twenty years ago. On the other hand the Messrs. Adams and Dr. Gray in their elaborate treatises unfortunately disregard the well-known and well-estab. lished laws of zoological nomenclature. In the meantime, until the whole collection is mounted, the arrangement is one of mere convenience. When mounting my own shells, all the duplicates were put into the Society's collection, and in this way over fifty species have been added to it. The work of editing the Society's Journal has led this year to a much larger amount of general correspondence than Jast, which has taken up time that would otherwise have been devoted to work in the Museum. Under many disadvantages and diffi- culties, and with many deficiencies and shortcomings to regret, it is yet hoped that the work done during the past session has not been altogether barren of results but that it may have tended in some small degree to help to popularize the study of. the natural sciences in the city. The various reports were ordered to be printed, the usual votes of thanks to the retiring officers duly passed, and the meeting proceeded to elect officers for the current year with the following result : OFFICERS FOR THE YEAR 1871-T2. President. — Mr. Principal Dawson (re-elected). Vice-Presidents. — Dr. Hunt, Rev. Dr. De Sola, Sir W.Logan, Dr. Carpenter, Messrs. Billings, Selwyn, Leeming and Barnston, Dr. Smallwood. Treasurer. — Mr. J. Ferrier, jun. (re-elected). Cor. Secretary. — Prof. Darey (re-elected). Rec. Secretary. — Mr. Whiteaves (re-elected). Council. — Messrs. Marler, Watt, McCord, B. Bell, Shelton, Edwards, Drummond, Murphy and Joseph. After naming the sub-committees, the meeting adjourned. 12§ THE CANAftlA:;r NATtyRAtiSI^. O ►-5 H O o u u -0 o o I— I O O >^ o CO I— ( w Eh < u la o i- CO o o o CM C<1 o o ro -^i fO CO rq r— « o •i- -H 1—1 r^ o r— 1 o lO €/^ CM Ul (O o o -*^ CJ 'o o X in ~t'^ o - ^ = S X "^ "*^ be a CJ i^ W -J G > « ^ ►-I --' f^ 1-5 I— ( O '5 - - - " >■• : i =3 . ■d d O -3 in P^ o O O — ( 1—1 •k* i>4 ^< "I O J— cc CO o &I o o CJ • CO C o CO s o -c a CO o u t-t P5 f-3 -a o 00 03 CO C3 a o c c-1 t}' CO O O CM 1— 1 >^ o o •* in O O CO 0 C-l O CO •^ 1 CM O O C/3 w h-i w 1— 1 H o f=< W O S-4 CO • o W r— > 1—1 00 1— 1 ^ hH ^ cc K-] ^H t/J 4J t—i ^ C 3 WW '■— ' 3 1—1 3 CJ h-i « c3 ^ so -:o o EH o o 813 :?5 o O rO f=) M ~ ^ a —1 OD '■^ Eiq o o £ ^ 4^pq3 H o en and " helium " No. 2.] BRITISH ASSOCIATION MEETING. 137 round the sun. (Frankland and Lockyer find the yellow promi- nences to give a very decided bright line not far from D, but hitherto not identified with any terrestrial flame. It seems to indicate a new substance, which they propose to call Helium.) I believe I may say, on the present occasion, when preparation must again be made to utilize a total eclipse of the sun, that the British Association confidently trusts to our Government exercis- ing the same wise liberality as heretofore in the interests of science. The old nebular hypothesis supposes the solar system and other similar systems through the universe which we see at a distance as stars, to have originated in the condensation of fiery nebulous matter. This hypothesis was invented before the discovery of thermo-dynamics, or the nebulas would not have been supposed to be fiery ; and the idea seems never to have occurred to any of its inventors or early supporters that the matter, the condensation of which they supposed to constitute the Sun and stars, could have been other than fiery in the beginning. Mayer first sug- gested that the heat of the Sun may be due to gravitation ; but he supposed meteors falling in to keep always generating the heat which is radiated year by year from the Sun. Helmholtz, on the other hand, adopting the nebular hypothesis, showed in 1854 that it was not necessary to suppose the nebulous matter to have been originally fiery, but that mutual gravitation between its parts may have generated the heat to which the present high tempera- ture of the Sun is due. Further, he made the important obser- vations that the potential energy of gravitation in the Sun is even now far from exhausted ; but that with further and further shrinking*; more and more heat is to be 2:enerated, and that thus we can conceive the Sun even now to possess a sufficient store of energy to produce heat and light, almost at present, for several million years of time future. It ought, however, to be added that this condensation can only follow from cooling, and therefore that Helmholtz's gravitational explanation of future Sun-heat amounts really to showing that the Sun's thermal capacity is enormously greater, in virtue of the mutual gravitation between the parts of so enormous a mass, than the sum of the thermal capacities of separate and smaller bodies of the same material and same total mass. Reasons for adopting this theory, and the con- sequences which follow from it, are discussed in an article ' On the Age of the Sun's Heat,' published in Mdcm'dUnis Magazine for March, 18G2. 138 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. VI. For a few years Mayer's theory of solar heat had seemed to me probable ; but I had been led to regard it as no longer tenable, because I had been in the first place driven, by consideration of the very approximate constancy of the Earth's period of revolu- tion round the Sun for the last 2,000 years, to conclude that " the principal source, perhaps the sole appreciably effective source of Sun-heat, is in bodies circulating round the Sun at present inside the Earth's orbit " ; and because Le Verrier's researches on the motion of the planet Mercury, though giving evidence of a sensible influence attributable to matter circulatino; as a great number of small planets within his orbit round the Sun, showed that the amount of matter that could possibly be assumed to circulate at any considerable distance from the Sun must be very small ; and therefore, " if the meteoric influx taking place at j^resent is enough to produce any appreciable portion of the heat radiated away, it must be supposed to be from matter circulating round the Sun, within very short distances of his surface. The density of this meteoric cloud would have to be supposed so great that comets could scarcely have escaped as comets actually have escaped, show- ing no discoverable efi'ects of resistance, after passing his surface within a distance equal to one-eighth of his radius. All things considered, there seems little probability in the hypothesis that solar radiation is compensated to any appreciable degree, by heat generated by meteors falling in, at present ; and, as it can be shown that no chemical theory is tenable, it must be concluded as most probable that the Sun is at present merely an incandescent liquid mass cooling." Thus on purely astronomical grounds was I long ago led to abandon as very improbable the hypothesis that the Sun's heat is supplied dynamically from year to year by the influx of meteors. But now spectrum analysis gives proof finally conclusive against it. Each meteor circulating round the Sun must fall in along a very gradual spiral path, and before reaching the Sun must have been for a long time exposed to an enormous heating efiect from his radiation when very near, and must thus have been driven into vapour before actually falling into the Sun. Thus, if Mayer's hypothesis is correct, friction between vortices of meteoric vapours and the Sun's atmosphere must be the immediate cause of solar heat; and the velocity with which these vapours circulate round equatorial parts of the Sun must amount to 435 kilometres per No, 2.] BRITISH ASSOCIATION MEETING. 139 second. Thespectrumtestof velocity applied by Lockyer showed but a twentieth part of this amount as the greatest observed relative velocity between different vapours in the Sun's atmos- phere. 5. NEBULiE, COMETS, AND METEORS. At the first Liverpool Meeting of the British Association (1854), in advancing a gravitational theory to account for all the heat, light, and motions of the universe, I urged that the immediately antecedent condition of the matter of which the Sun and Planets were formed, not being fiery, could not have been gaseous ; but that it probably was solid, and may have been like the meteoric stones which we still so frequently meet with through space. The discovery of Huggins, that the light of the Nebulas, so far as hitherto sensible to us, proceeds from incandescent hydrogen and nitroo-en s-ases, and that the heads of comets also give us light of incandescent gas, seems at first sight literally to fulfil that part of the Nebular hypothesis to which T had objected. But a solution, which seems to me in the highest degree probable, has been sug- gested by Tait. He supposes that it may be by ignited gaseous exhalations proceeding from the collision of meteoric stones that nebulae and the heads of comets show themselves to us; and he suggested, at a former meeting of the Association, that experi- ments should be made for the purpose of applying spectrum analysis to the light which has been observed in gunnery trials, such as those at Shoeburyness, when iron strikes against iron at a great velocity, but varied by substituting for the iron various solid materials, metallic or stony. Hitherto this suggestion has not been acted upon; but surely it is one the carrying out of which ought to be promoted by the British Association. Most important steps have been recently made towards the discovery of the natv .-e of comets ; establishing with nothing short of certainty the trut^ . of a hypothesis which had long appeared to me probable, — that they consist of groups of meteoric stones ; accounting satisfactorily for the light of the nucleus, and giving a simple and rational explanation of phenomena presented by the tails of comets which had been regarded by the greatest astrono- mers as almost preternaturally marvellous. The meteoric hypo- thesis to which I have referred remained a mere hypothesis, (I do not know that it was ever even published,) until, in ]8G(3, Schiaparelli calculated, from observations on the August meteors, an orbit for these bodies which he found to agree almost perfectly 140 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. with the orbit of the great comet of 1862, as calculated by Oppolzer ; and so discovered and demonstrated that a comet con- sists of a group of meteoric stones. Prof. Newton, of Yale Col- lege, United States, by examining ancient records, ascertained that in periods of about thirty-three years, since the year 902, there have been exceptionally brilliant displays of the November meteors. It had lono- been believed that these interestins; visi- tants came from a train of small detached planets circulating round the Sun, all in nearly the same orbit, and constituting a belt analogous to Saturn's ring ; and that the reason for the com- paratively large number of meteors which we observe annually about the 14th of November is, that at that time the earth's orbit cuts through the supposed meteoric belt. Prof. Newton concluded from his investigation that there is a denser j)art of the group of meteors which extends over a portion of the orbit so great as to occupy about one-tenth or one-fifteenth of the periodic time in passing any particular point, and gave a choice of five difierent periods for the revolution of this meteoric stream round the sun, any one of which would satisfy his statistical result. He further concluded that the line of nodes, that is to say, the line in which the plane of the meteoric belt cuts the plane of the earth's orbit, has a progressive sidereal motion of about 52"-4 per annum. Here, then, was a sj)lendid problem for the physical astronomer ; and, happily, one well qualified for the task took it up. Adams, by the application of a beautiful method invented by G-auss, found that of the five periods allowed by Newton, just one per- mitted the motion of the line of nodes to be explained by the disturbing influence of Jupiter, Saturn, and other planets. The period chosen on these grounds is 33^ years. The investigation showed further that the form of the orbit is a long ellipse, giving for shortest distance from the sun 145 million kilometres, and for longest distance 2^895 million kilometres. Adams also worked out the longtitude of the perihelion and the inclination of the orbit's plane to the plane of the elliptic. The orbit which he thus found agreed so closely with that of Temple's Comet I. 1866, that he was able to identify the comet and the meteoric belt.^^ The same conclusion had been pointed out a few weeks * Signer Schiaparelli, Director of the Observatory of Milan, wiio, in a letter dated 3lst of December, 1866, pointed out that the elements of the oi-bit of the August Meteors, calculated from the observed posi- No. 2.] BRITISH ASSOCIATION MEiETINO. 141 earlier by Schiaparelli, from calculations by himself, on data sup- plied by direct observations on the meteors, and independently by Peters, from calculations by Leverrier on the same foundation. It is, therefore, thoroughly established that Temple's Comet I. 1866, consists of an elliptic train of minute planets, of which a few thousands or millions fall to the earth annually about the 14th of November, when we cross their track. We have probably not yet passed through the very nucleus or densest part ; but thirteen times, in Octobers and Novembers, from October 13, a.d. 902, to November 14, 1866, inclusive (this last time having been cor- rectly predicted by Prof. Newton), we have passed through a part of the belt greatly denser than the average. The densest part of the train, when near enough to us, is visible as the head of the comet. This astounding result, taken along with Huggins's spec- troscopic observations on the light of the heads and tails of comets, confirm most strikingly Tait's theory of comets, to which I have already referred; according to which the comet, a group of me- teoric stones, is self-luminous in its nucleus, on account of colli- sions among its constituents, while its " tail" is merely a portion of the less dense part of the train illuminated by sunlight, and visible or invisible to us according to circumstances, not only of tion of their radiant point on the supposition of the orbit being a very elongatedellipse, agreed very closely with those of the orbit of Comet II. 1862, calculated by Dr. Oppolzer. In the same letter Schiaparelli gives elements of the orbit of the November meteors, but these were not sufficiently accurate to enable him to identify the orbit with that of any known comet. On the 21st of January, 1867, M. Leverrier gave more accurate elements of the orbit of the November meteors, and in the Astronomische Nachrichten of January 9, Mr. C. F. W. Peters, of Altona, pointed out that these elements closely agreed with those of Temple's Comet (I. 1866), calculated by Dr. Oppolzer, and on Febru- ary 2, Schiaparelli, having re-calculated the elements of the orbit of the meteors, himself noticed the same agreement. Adams arrived quite independently at the conclusion that the orbit of 33^ years period is the one which must be chosen, out of the five indicated by Prof. Newton. His calculations were sufficiently advanced before the letters referred to appeared, to show that the other four orbits offered by Newton were inadmissible. But the calculations to be gone through to find the secular motion of the node in such an elongated orbit as that of the meteors, were necessarily very long, so that th^y were not completed till about March, 1867. They were communicated in that month to the Cambridge Philosophical Society, and in the month fol- lowing to the Astronomical Societv. i42 THU CANAI^iAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vL density, degree of illumination, and nearness, but also of tactic arrangement, as of a flock of birds or the edge of a cloud of tobacco smoke ! What prodigious difficulties are to be explained? you may judge from two or three sentences which I shall read from Herschel's Astronomy, and from the fact that even Schia- parelli seems still to believe in the repulsion : '' There is, beyond question, some profound secret and mystery of nature concerned in the phenomena of their tails. Perhaps it is not too much to hope that future observation, borrowing every aid from rational speculation, grounded on the progress of physical science generally (especially those branches of it which relate to the ethereal or imponderable elements), may enable us ere long to penetrate this mystery, and to declare whether it is really r.Mtter in the ordinary acceptation of the term which is projected from their heads with such extraordinary velocity, and if not impelled^ at least directed, in its course, by reference to the Sun, as its point of avoidance." "In no respect is the question as to the materiality of the tail more forcibly pressed on us for consideration than in that of the enormous sweep which it makes round the Sun in periJielio in the manner of a straight and rigid rod, in defiance of the law of gravitation, nay, even, of the received laws of motion." " The projection of this ray. ... to so enormous a length, in a single day, conveys an impression of the intensity of the forces acting to produce such a velocity of material transfer through space, such as no other natural phenomenon is capable of exciting. It is clear that if we have to deal her e^ with matter, such as we conceive it, viz., p>ossessing inertia — at all, it must be under the dominion of forces incomparably more energetic than gravitation, and quite of a diffi3rent nature." Think now of the admirable simplicity with which Tait's beautiful ''sea-bird analogy," as it has been called, can explain all these phenomena. 6. BIOLOGICAL RESEARCH. The essence of science, as is well illustrated by astronomy and cosmical physics, consists in inferring antecedent conditions, and anticipating future evolutions, from phenomena which have actu- ally come under observation. In biology the difficulties of suc- cessfully acting up to this ideal are prodigious. The earnest naturalists of the present day are, however, not appalled or para- lyzed by them, and are struggling boldly and laboriously to pags No. 2.] BRiTisit Association meeting. 143 out of the mere " Natural History stage " of their study, and bring zoology within the range of Natural Philosophy. A very ancient speculation, still clung to by many naturalists (so much so that I have a choice of modern terms to quote in expressing it) supposes that, under meteorological conditions very different from the present, dead matter may have run together or crystallized or fermented into "germs of life."' or "organic cells," or "proto- plasm." But science brings a vast mass of inductive evidence against this hypothesis of spontaneous generation, as you have heard from my predecessor in the Presidential chair. Careful enough scrutiny has, in every case up to the present day, discovered life as antecedent to life. Dead matter cannot become living without coming under the influence of matter previously alive. This seems to me as sure a teaching of science as the law of gra- vitation. I utterly repudiate, as opposed to all philosophical uniformitarianism, the assumption of "different meteorological conditions" — that is to say, somewhat different vicissitudes of temperature, pressure, moisture, gaseous atmosphere — to produce or to permit that to take place by force or motion of dead matter alone, which is a direct contravention of what seems to us biolo- gical law. I am prepared for the answer, " our code of biologi- cal law is an expression of our ignorance as well as of our know- ledge." And I say, yes; search for spontaneous generation out of inorganic materials ; let any one not satisfied with the purely negative testimony of which we have now so much against it, throw himself into the inquiry. Such investigations as those of Pasteur, Pouchet, and Bastian are among the most interesting and momentous in the whole range of Natural History, and their results, whether positive or negative, must richly reward the most careful and laborious experimenting. I confess to being deeply impressed by the evidence put before us by Prof. Huxley, and I am ready to adopt, as an article of scientific faith, true through all space and through all time, that life proceeds from life, and from nothins; but life. 1. origin of life. How, then, did life originate on the earth? Tracing the phy- sical history of the earth backwards, on strict dynamical princi- ples, we are brought to a red-hot melted globe, on which no life could exist. Hence when the earth was first fit for life, there was no living thing on it. There were rocks solid and disinte- 144 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. grated, water", air all round, warmed and illuminated by a brilli- ant sun, ready to become a garden. Did grass and trees and flowers spring into existence, in all the fulness of ripe beauty, by a fiat of Creative Power? or did vegetation, growing up from seed sown, spread and multiply over the whole earth ? Science is bound, by the everlasting law of honour, to fiice fearlessly every problem which can fairly be presented to it. If a probable solution, consistent with the ordinary course of nature, can be found, we must not invoke an abnormal act of Creative Power. When a lava stream flows down the sides of Vesuvius or Etna it quickly cools and becomes solid ; and after a few weeks or years it teems with vegetable and animal life, which for it originated by the transport of seed and ova and by the migration of individual living creatures. When a volcanic island springs up from the sea, and after a few years is found clothed with vegetation, we do not hesitate to assume that seed has been wafted to it through the air, or floated to it on rafts. Is it not possible, and if possible, is it not probable, that the beginning of vegetable life on the earth is to be similarly explained ? Every year thousands, pro- bably millions, of fragments of solid matter fall upon the earth — whence came these fragments ? What is the previous history of any one of them ? Was it created in the beginning of time an amorphous mass ? This idea is so unacceptable that, tacitly or explicitly, all men discard it. It is often assumed that all, and it is certain that some, meteoric stones are fragments which had been broken ofi" from greater masses and launched free into space. It is as sure that collisions must occur between great masses moving through space as it is that ships, steered without intelligence directed to prevent collision, could not cross and re- cross the Atlantic for thousands of years with immunity from collisions. When two great masses come into collision in space it is certain that a large part of each is melted ; but it seems also quite certain that in many cases a large quantity of debris must be shot forth in all directions, much of which may have experi- enced no greater violence than individual pieces of rock experi- ence in a land-slip or in blasting by gunpowder. Should the time when this earth comes into collision with any other body, com- parable in dimensions to itself, be when it is still clothed as at present with vegetation, many great and small fragments carrying seed and living plants and animals would undoubtedly be scattered through space. Hence and because we all confidently believe that No. 2.] BRITISH ASSOCIATION MEETING. 145 there are at present, and have been from time immemorial, many worlds of life besides our own, we must regard it as probable in the hio'hest dec-ree that there arc countless seed-beariuii; meteoric stones moving about through space. If at the present instant no life existed, upon this earth, one such stone falling upon it might, by what we blindly call natural causes, lead to its becom- ing covered with vegetation. I am fully conscious of the many scientific objections which may be urged against this hypothesis, but I believe them to be all answerable. I have already taxed your patience too severely to allow me to think of discussing any of them on the present occasion. The hypothesis that life origi- nated on this earth through moss-grown fragments from the ruins of another world may seem wild and visionary; all T maintain is that this is not unscientific. 8. THE DARWINIAN THEORY. From the Earth stocked with such vegetation as it could receive meteorically, to the Earth teeming with all the endless variety of plants and animals which now inhabit it, the step is prodigious; yet, according to the doctrine of continuity, most ably laid before the Association by a predecessor in this chair (Mr. Grove), all creatures now living on earth have proceeded by orderly evolu- tion from some such origin. Darwin concludes his great work on ' The Origin of Species ' with the following words : — " It is in- teresting to contemplate an entangled bank clothed with many plants of many kinds, with birds singing on the bushes, with vari- ous insects flitting about, and with worms crawling through the damp earth, and to reflect that these elaborately constructed forms, so diflerent from each other, and dependent on each other in so complex a manner, have all been produced by laws acting around us." . . . "There is grandeur in this view of life with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one ; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning, endless forms, most beautiful and most wonderful, have been and are being evolved." With the feeling expressed in these two sentences I most cordially sympathize. I have omitted two sentences which come between them, describing briefly the hypothesis of " the origin of species by natural selec- tion," because I have always felt tliat this hypothesis does not contain the true theory of evolution, if evolution there has been, Vol. VI. B No. 2. 146 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. in biology. Sir John Herscliel, in expressing a favourable judg- ment on the hj23othesis of zoological evolution, with, however, some reservation in respect to the origin of man, objected to the doctrine of natural selection, that it was too like the Laputan method of making books, and that it did not sufficiently take into account a continually guiding and controlling intelligence. This seems to me a most valuable and instructive criticism. I feel profoundly convinced that the argument of design has been greatly too much lost sight of in recent zoological speculations. Reaction against the frivolities of teleology, such as are to be found, not rarely, in the notes of the learned commentators on Paley's ' Natural Theology,' has, I believe, had a temporary effect in turnins; attention from the solid and irrefraoable aro-ument so well put forward in that excellent old book. But overpoweringly strong proofs of intelligent and benevolent design lie all round us, and if ever perplexities, whether metaphysical or scientific, turn us away from them for a time, they come back upon us with irresistible force, showing to us through nature the influence of a free will, and teaching us that all living beings depend on one ever-actino- Creator and Ruler. The Biological Section was presided over by Prof. Allan Thompson, who delivered the following address : — I must content myself with endeavouring to express to you some of the ideas which arise in my mind in looking back from the present upon the state of Biological science at the time, forty years since, when the meetings of the British Association com- menced— a period which I am tempted to particularise from its happening to coincide very nearly with the time at which I be- gan my career as a public teacher in one of the departments of biology in this city. In the few remarks which I shall make, it will be my object to show the prodigious advance which has taken place not only in the knowledge of our subject as a whole, but also in the ascertained relation of its parts to each other, and in the place which this kind of knowledge has gained in the estimation of the educated part of the community, and the consequent increase in the freedom with which the search after truth is now asserted in this as in other departments of science. And first, in connection with the distribution of the various subjects which are included under this section, I may remark that the general title under which the whole section D has met since 1866, viz, Biology, No. 2.] BRITISH ASSOCIATION MfiETINCJ. 147 seems to be advantageous both from its convenience, and as tcnd- .inir to promote the great consolidation of our science, and a justcr npjircciation of the relation of its several parts. It may be that looking merely to the derivation of the term, it is strictly more nearly synonymous with physiology in the sense in which that word has been for a long time employed, and therefore designating the science of life, rather than the description of the living beings in which it is manifested. But until a better or more comprehen- sive term be found we may accept that of biology under the general definition of " the science of life and of living beings," or as comprehending the history of the whole range of organic nature — vegetable as well as animal. The propriety of the adoption of such a general term is further shown by a glance at the changes which the title and distribution of the subordinate departments of this section have undergone during the period of the existence of the Association, HISTORY OF THE SECTION, During the first four years of this period the Section met under the combined designation of Zoology and Botany, Physio- logy and Anatomy — words sufficiently clearly indicating the scope of its subjects of investigation. In the next ten years a connection with Medicine was recognised by the establishment of a sub- section or department of Medical Science, in which, however, scientific anatomy and physiology formed the most prominent topics, though not to the exclusion of more strictly medical and surgical or professional subjects. During the next decade, or from the year 1845, we find along with Zoology and Botany a sub-sec- tion of physiology, and in several years of the same time alouu" with the latter a separate department of Ethnology. But in the eleven years which extended from 1855 to 1865, the branch of Ethnology was associated with Geography in Section F. And more recently, or since the arrangement which was commenced in 1866, the section Biology has included, with some slight variation, the whole of its subjects in three departments. Under one of these are brought all investigations in Anatomy and Physiology of a general kind, thus embracing the whole range of these sciences when without special application. A second of these sub -sections has been occupied with the extensive subjects of Botany and Zoology; while the third has been devoted to the subject of Anthropology, in which all researches having a special reference 148 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. to the structure and functions or life history of man have been received and discussed. Such I understand to be the arrano-ement under which we shall meet on this occasion. At the conclusion of my remarks, therefore, the sub-section for Anatomy and Physi- ology will remain with me in this room ; while the sub-section of Zoology and Botany, on the one hand, and of Anthropology on the other, will adjourn to the apartments which have been provided for them respectively, ANTHROPOLOGY. With regard to the position of Anthropology, as including Ethno- logy, and comprehending the whole natural history of man, there ma}' be still some differences of opinion, according to the point of view from which its phenomena are regarded : as by some they may be viewed chiefly in relation to the bodily stucture and func- tion of individuals or numbers of men ; or as by others they may be considered more directly with reference to their national cha- racter and history, and the affinities of languages and customs ; or by a third set of inquirers, who are inclined to devote their prin- cipal attention to the facts and views bearing upon the origin of man and his relation to animals. As the first and third of these sets of topics entirely belong to Biology, and as those parts of the second set which do not properly fall under that branch may with propriety find a place under Geography or Statistics, I feel inclined to adhere to the distinct reco2;nition of a sub-section — Anthro- pology, in its present form ; and I think that the suitableness of this arrangement is apparent, from the nature and number of the communications properly falling under such a sub-section which have been received under the last distribution of the sub- jects. CONDITION OF BIOLOGICAL RESEARCH. The beneficial influence of the British Association in promoting biological research is made apparent by the number and import- ance of the reports on various subjects, as well as of the commu- nications to the sections. Of the latter, the number received annually has been nearly doubled in the course of the last twenty years. Nor can it be doubted that this influence has been ma- terially assisted by the contributions in money made by the Association in aid of various biological investigations ; for it appears that out of the whole sum of nearly £34,500 contributed by the Association to the promotion of scientific research, about No. 2.] BRITISH ASSOCIATION MEETING. 149 £2800 has been devoted to biological purposes, to which it would be fair to add a part at least of the grants for Palgeontological researches, many of which must be acknowledged to stand in close relation to Biology. The enormous extent of knowledge and research in the various departments of Biology has become a serious impediment to its more complete study, and leads to the danger of confined views on the part of those whose attention, from necessity or taste, is too exclusively directed to the details of one department, or even, as often happens, to a subdivision of it. It would seem, indeed, as if our predecessors in the last genera- tions, possessed this superior advantage in the then existing nar- rower boundaries of knowledge, that they were able more easily to overtake the contemplation of a wider field, and to follow out researches in more than one of the sciences. To such combina- tion of varied knowledge, united with their transcendent powers of sound generalization and accurate observation, must be ascribed the wide-spread and enduring influence of the works of such men as Haller, Linnaeus, and Cuvier, Yon Baer and Joannes Miiller. There are doubtless brilliant instances in our own time of men endowed with similar powers ; but the difficulty of bringing these powers into eifectual operation in a wide range is now so great, that while the amount of research in special biological subjects is enormous, it must be reserved for comparatively few to be the authors of great systems, or of enduring broad and general views which embrace the whole rano-e of biolo;2;ical science. It is in- cumbent on all those, therefore, who are desirous of promoting the advance of biological knowledge to combat the confined views which are apt to be engendered by the too great restriction of study to one department. However much subdivision of labour may now be necessary in the origin, investigation, and elaboration of new facts in our science (and the necessity for such subdivision will necessarily increase as knowledge extends), there must be se- cured at first, by a wider study of the general principles and some of the details of collateral branches of knowledge, that power of justly comparing and correlating facts which will mature the judgment and exclude partial views. To refer only to one bright example, I may say that it can scarcely be doubted that it is the unequalled variety and extent of knowledge, combined with the faculty of bringing the most varied facts together in new combina- tion, which has enabled Dr. Darwin (whatever may be thought otherwise of his system) to give the greatest impulse which has 150 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. been felt iu our own times to the progress of biological views and thought ; and it is most satisfactory to observe the effect which this influence is already producing on the scientific mind of this country, in opposing the tendency perceptible in recent times to the too restricted study of special departments of natural history. I need scarcely remind you that for the proper investigation and jndgmeut of problems in physiology, a full know^ledge of anatomy in general, and much of comparative anatomy, of histology and embryology, of organic chemistry, and of physics, is indispensable as a preliminary to all successful physiological observation and experiment. The anatomist again, who would profess to describe rationally and correctly the structure of the human body, must have acquired a knowledge of the principles of morphology de- rived from the study of comparative anatomy and development, and he must have mastered the intricacies of histological research. The comparative anatomist must be an accomplished embryolo- gist in the whole range of the animal kingdom, or in any single division of it which he professes to cultivate. The zoologist and the botanist must equally found their descriptions and systematic distinctions on morphological, histological, and embryological data. And thus the whole of these departments of biological science are so interwoven and united that the scientific investiga- tion of no one can now be regarded as altogether separate from that of the others. It has been the work of the last forty years to brins: that intimate connection of the biological sciences more and more fully into prominent view, and to infuse its spirit into all scientific investigation. But while in all the departments of biology prodigious advances have been made, there are two more especially which merit particular attention as having almost taken their origin within the period I now refer to, and as having made the most rapid progress in themselves, and have influenced most powerfully and w^idely the progress of discovery, and the views of biologists in other departments — I mean histology and embry- ology. HISTOLOGY. I need scarcely remind those present that it was only within a few years before the foundation of the British Association that the su<>i>estions of Lister in res-ard to the construction of achro- matic lenses brought the compound microscope into such a state of improvement as caused it to be restored, as I might say, to the place which the more imperfect instrument had lost in the pre- No. 2.] BRITISH ASSOCIATION MEETING. 151 vious century. The result of this restoration became apparent in the foundation of a new era in the knowleds-e of the minute cha- racters of textureal structure, under the joint guidance of R. Brown and Ehrenbers:, so as at hist to have entitled this branch of inquiry, to its designation, by Mr. Huxley, of the exhaustive investigation of structural elements. All who hear me are fully aware of the influence which, from 1838 onwards, the researches of Schwann and Schleiden exerted on the progress of Histology and the views of anatomists and physiologists as to the structure ' and development of the textures, and the prodigious increase which followed in varied microscopic observations. It is not for me here even to allude to the steps of that rapid progress by which a new branch of anatomical science has been created ; nor can I venture to enter upon any of the interesting questions presented by this department of the microscopic anatomy ; nor attempt to discuss any of those possessing so much interest at the present moment, such as the nature of the organised cell or the properties of protoplasm. I would only remark that it is now very generally admitted that the cell wall (as Schwann indeed himself pointed out) is not a source of new production, though still capable of considerable structural change after the time of its first formation. The nucleus has also lost some of the importance attached to it by Schwann and his earlier followers, as an essential constituent of the cell, while the protoplasm of the cell remains in undisputed possession of the field as the more immediate seat of the pheno- mena of growth and organisation, and of the contractile property which forms so remarkable a feature of their substance. I cor- dially agree with much of what Mr, Huxley has written on this subject in 1853 and 1869, The term physical basis of life may perhaps be in some trifling respect objectionable, but I look upon the recognition of protoplasm, as a general term indicating that part of the tissue of plants and animals which is the constant seat of the growing and moving powers as a most important step in the recent progress of histology. To Maechel the fuller history of this in lowest forms is due. To Dr. Beale we owe the fullest investi- gation of these properties by the use of magnifying powers be- yond any that had previously been known, and the successful employment of re-agents which appear to mark out distinction from the other elements of the textures. I may remark, however, in passing, that I am inclined to regard contractile protoplasm, whether vegetable or animal, as in no instance entirely amorphous 152 THE CA>'ADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. or houjogeneous, but rather as always presenting some minute molecular structure which distinguishes it from parts of glassy clearness. Admitting that the form it assumes is not necessarily that of a regular cell, and may be various and irregular in a few exceptional instances, I am not on that account disposed to give up definite structure as one of the universal characteristics of or- U'anisation in livino; bodies. T would also suirsrest that the term formative and nonformative, or some others, should be substituted for those of living and dead, employed by Dr. Beale to distin- guish the jDrotoplasm from the cell-wall or its derivation, as those terms are liable to introduce confusion. EMBRYOLOGY. To the discoveries in embryology and development I might have been tempted to refer more at large, as being those which have had, of all modern research, the greatest effect in extending and modifying biological views, but I am warned from entering upon a subject in which I might trespass too much on your pati- ence. The merits of Wolff as the great first pioneer in the ac- curate observation of the phenomena of development were clearly pointed out by Mr. Huxley in his presidential address of last year. Under the influence of Bollinger's teaching, Pander, and afterwards Yon Baer and Rathke established the foundations of the modern history of embryology. It was only in the year 1827 that the ovum of mammals was discovered by Yon Baer; the segmentation of the yolk, first observed by Prevost and Dumas in the frog's ovum in 1824, was ascertained to be 2;eneral in sue- ceeding years ; so that the whole of the interesting and important additions which have followed, and have made embryological de- velopment a complete science, have been included within the event- ful period of the life of this Association. I need not say how distinguished the Germans have been by their contributions to the history of animal development. The names of Bischoff, Beichart, Kolliker, and Remak are sufficient to indicate the most important of the steps in recent progress, without attempting to enumerate a host of others wdio have assisted in the great work thus founded. I am aware that the mere name of development suggests to some ideas of painful nature as associated with the theory of evolution recently promulgated. To one accustomed during the whole of his career to trace the steps by which evwy living being, including man himself, passes from the condition of No. 2.] BRITISH ASSOCIATION MEETING. 153 an almost imperceptible germ, through a long series of clianges of form and structure into their perfect state, the name of develop- ment is rather sucirestive of that which seems to be the common CO history of all living beings ; and it is not wonderful therefore that such a one should regard with approval the more extended view which supposes a process of development to belong to the whole of nature. How far that principle may be carried, to what point the origin of man or any animal can by history, facts or reasoning be traced in the long unchronicled history of the world, and whether living beings may arise independently of parents or germs of previously existing organisms, or may spring from the direct combination of the elements of dead matter, are questions upon which we may expect this section may endeavour to guide the hesitating opinion of the time. I cannot better express the state of opinion in which I find myself than by quoting the words of Professor Huxley from his address of last year, p. Ixxxiii. : — " But though I cannot express this conviction of mine too strongly (viz., the occurrence of abiogenesis), I must carefully guard myself against the supposition that I intend to suggest that no such thing as abiogenesis ever has taken place in the past, or ever will take place in the future. With organic chemistry, molecular physics, and physiology yet in their infancy, and every day making prodigious strides, I think it would be the height of presumption for any man to say that the conditions under which "matter assumes the properties we call 'vital,' may not some day be artificially brought together. And again, if it were given me to look beyond the abyss of geologically recorded time, to the still more remote period when the earth was passing through physical and chemical conditions, which it can no more see again than a man can recall his infancy, I should expect to be a witness of the evolution of living protoplasm from living matter." I will quote further a few wise words from the discourse to which many of you must have listened last evening with admiration. Sir Wm. Thomson said — " The essence of science, as is well illustrat- ed by astronomy and cosmical physics, consists in inferring ante- cedent conditions, and anticipating future evolutions, from pheno- mena which have actually come under observation. In biology, the difficulty of successfully acting up to this ideal are prodigious. Our code of biological law is an expression of our ignorance as as well as of our knowledge. Search for spontaneous generation out of inorganic materials; let any one not satisfied with the 154 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. purely negative testimony, of whicli we have now so much against it, throw himself into the inquiry. Such investigations as those of Pasteur, Pouchet and Bastian are among the most interesting and momentous in the whole range of natural history ; and their results, whether positive or negative, 'must richly reward the most careful and laborious experimenting." The consideration of the finest discoverable structures of the organised parts of living bodies is intimately bound up with that of their chemical composition and properties. The progress which has been made in organic chemistry belongs not only to the knowledge of the composition of the constituents of organised bodies, but also in the manner in which that composition is chemically viewed. Its peculiar feature, especially as related to biological investigation, consists in the results of the introduction of the synthetic method of re- search, which has enabled the chemist to imitate or to form artifi cially a greater and greater number of the organic compounds. In 1828 the first of these substances was formed by Wohler, by a synthetic process, as cyanate of ammonia ; and still, though some no doubt entertained juster views, the opinion prevailed among chemists and physiologists that there was some great and fundamental difference in the chemical phenomena and laws of organic and inorganic nature. But now this supposed barrier has been in a great measure broken down and removed, and chemists, with almost one accord, regard the laws of combination of the elements as essentially the same in both classes of bodies, what- ever differences may exist in actual composition, or in the reaction of organic bodies in the more complex and often obscure condi- tions vitality, as compared with the simpler and, on the whole, better known phenomena of a chemical nature observed in the mineral kingdom. Thus, by the synthetic method, there have been formed among the simpler organic compounds a great num- ber of alcohols, hydrocarbons, and fatty acids. But the most re- markable example of the synthetic formation of an organic com- pound is that of the alkaloid conia, as recently obtained by Hugo Schiffby certain reactions from butyric aldehyde, itself an artificial product. This substance, so formed, and its compounds, possess all the properties of the natural conia — chemical, physical, and physiological — being equally poisonous with it. The colouring- matter of madder, or alizarine, is another organic compound which has been formed by artifical processes. It is true that the organ- ised or containing solid, either of vegetable or animal bodies, has No. 2.] BRITISH ASSOCIATION MEETING. 155 not as yet yielded to the iDgenuity of chemical artifice ; nor, in- deed, is the actual composition of one of the most important of these, albumen and its allies, fully known. But as chemists have only recently began to discover the track by which they may be led to the synthesis of organic compounds, it is warrantable to hope that ere long cellulose and lignine may be found ; and, great as the difficulties with regard to the albumenoid compounds may at present appear, the synthetic formation of these is by no means to be despaired of, but, on the contrary, may with confidence be expected to crown their efforts. From all recent research, it ap- pears to result that the general nature of the properties belonging to the products of animal and vegetable life, can no longer be regarded as different from those of minerals, in so far at least as they are the subject of chemical investigation. The union of elements and their separation, whether occurring in an animal, a vegetable or a mineral body, must be looked upon as dependent on innate powers or properties belonging to the elements themselves ; and the phenomena of change of composition of organic bodies occurring in the living state are not the less chemical because they are different from those observed in ors-anic nature. All chemical actions are liable to vary according to the conditions in which they occur, and many instances might be adduced of most remarkable variations of this kind, observed in the chemistry of dead bodies from very slight changes of electrical, calorific, mechanical, and other conditions. But because these conditions are infinitely more complex and far less known in living bodies, it is not necessary to look upon the actions as essentially of a different kind, to have recourse to the hypothesis of vital affinities, and still less to shelter ourselves under the slim curtain of ignorance implied in the ex- planation of the most varied chemical pheuomena by the influence of a vital principle. EVOLUTION OF SPECIES. On the subjects of zoological and botanical classification and anthropology, it would be out of place for me now to make any observations at length. I will only remark, in regard to the first, that the period now under review has witnessed a very great mo- dification in the aspect which the affinities of the bodies belong- iuir to these two ^reat kingdoms of nature bear to each other, and the principles on which in each groups of bodies are associa- ted together in classification ; for, in the first place, the older 156 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. view has been abandoued that the complication of structure rises in a continually increasing and continuous gradation from one kingdom to the other, or extends in one line from one group to an- other in either of the kingdoms separately. Evolution into a gradually increasing complexity of structure and function no doubt exists in both, so that types of formation must be acknow- ledged to pervade, accompanied by typical resemblance of the plan of formation of a most interesting nature ; but it has become more and more apparent in the progress of morphological research that the different groups form rather circles, which touch one another at certain points of greatest resemblance, rather than one continu- ous line, or even a number of lines, which partially pass each other. Certain simpler bodies of the two kingdoms^of nature thus exhibit the increasing resemblance to each other, until at last the differ- ences between them wholly disappear, and we reach a point of contact at which the properties become almost indistinguishable, as in the remarkable Protista of Haeckel and others. I fully agree, however, with the view stated by Professor Wyville Thom- son in his introductory lecture, that it is not necessary on this account to recognize with Haeckel a third intermediate kingdom of nature. Each kingdom presents, as it were, a radiating expan- sion into groups for itself, so that the relations of the two king- doms might be represented by the divergence of lines spreading in two different directions from a common point. Recent observa- tions on the chorda dorsalis of some Ascidians (or supposed no- tochord) tend to revive the discussion at one time prevalent, but long in abeyance, as to the possibility of tracing a homology be- tween the vertebrate and invertebrate animals ; and, should this correspondence be confirmed and extended, it may be expected to modify greatly our present views of zoological affinities and classi- fication, and be an additional proof of the importance of minute and embryological research in such determinations. The recog- nition of homological resemblance of animals, to which in this country the researches of Owen and Huxley have contributed so largely, form one of the most interesting subjects of contemplation in the study of comparative anatomy and zoology in our time ; but I must refrain from touching on so seductive and difficult a subject. NATURAL SCIENCE IN SCHOOLS. There is another topic to which I can refer with pleasure as connected with the cultivation of biological knowledge in this No. 2.] BRITISH ASSOCIATION MEETING. 157 country, and that is the introduction of instruction in natural science into the system of education of our schools. As to the feasibility of this in the primary schools, I believe most of those who are intimately acquainted with the management of these schools have expressed their decidedly favourable opinion — it being found that a portion of the time now allotted to the three great requisites of a primary education might with advantage be set apart, for the purpose of instructing the pupils in subjects of com- mon interest, calculated to awaken in their minds a desire for knowledge of the various objects presented by the field of nature around them. As to the benefit which may result from this measure to the persons so instructed, it is scarcely necessary for me to say anything in this place. It is so obvious that whatever knowledge, though easily acquired, and even of the most elemen- tary kind, tends to enlarge the range of observation and thought, must have some efiect in removing its recipients from grosser in- fluences, and may even give information which may prove useful in social economy and in the occupations of labour. Nor need I point out how much more extended the advantages of such in- , struction may prove if introduced into the system of our secondary schools, and more freely combined than heretofore with the two exclusively literary and philosophical study which has so long pre- vailed in the approved British education. Without disparage- ment to those modes of study as in themselves necessary and use- ful, and excellent means of disciplining the mind to learning, I cannot but hold it as certain that the mind which is entirely with- out scientific cultivation is but half prepared for the common pur- poses of modern life, and is entirely unqualified for forming a judg- ment on some of the most difiicult and yet most common and im- portant questions of the day, afiecting the interests of the whole community. I refer with great pleasure to the cogent arguments addressed yesterday by Dr. Bennet to the medical graduates of the University, in favour of the establishment of physiology as a subject of general education in this country with reference to sani- tary conditions. It is gratifying, therefore, to perceive that the suggestions made some time ago in regard to this subject by the British Association, through its committee, have already borne good fruit, and that the attention of those who preside over edu- cation in this country, as well as of the public themselves, is more earnestly directed to the object of securing for the lowest as well as the highest classes of the community that wholesome combination 158 THE CANADIAN NATURALtsT. [Vol. Vi. of knowledge derived from education, whicli will duly cultivate all the faculties of the mind, and thus fit a greater and greater number for applying themselves with increased ability and know- ledge to the purposes of their living and its improved condition. If the law of the survival of the fittest be applicable to the men- tal as well as to the physical improvement of our race (and who can doubt that it must be so), we are bound by motives of inter- est and duty to secure for all classes of the people that kind of education which will lead to the development of the highest and most varied mental power. And no one who has been observant of the recent progress of the useful arts and its influence upon the moral, social, and political condition of our population, can doubt that that education must include instruction in the pheno- mena of external nature, including, more especially, the laws and conditions of life ; and be, at the same time, such as will adapt the mind to the ready reception of varied knowledge, "It is obvi- ous too, that while this more immediately useful or beneficial effect on the common mind may be produced by the diff"usion of natural knowledge among the people, biological science will share in the gain accruing to all branches of natural science, by the greater favour which will be accorded to its cultivators, and the increased freedom from prejudice with which their statements are received and considered by learned as well as by unscientific per- sons. SPIRITUALISM. I cannot conclude these observations without adverting to one aspect in which it might be thought that biological science has taken a retrograde rather than an advanced position. In this, I do not mean to refer to the special cultivators of biology in its true sense, but to the fact that there appears to have taken place of late a considerable increase in the number of persons who be- lieve, or who imagine that they believe, in the class of phenome- na which are now called spiritual, but which have been long known — since the exhibitions of Mesmer, and indeed, long before his time — under the most varied forms, as liable to occur in persons of an imaginative turn of mind and peculiar nervous susceptibility. It is still more to be deplored that many persons devote a large share of their time to the practice — for it does not deserve the name of study or investigation — of the alleged phenomena, and that a few men of acknowledged reputation in some departments of science have lent their names, and surrendered their judgment, No. 2.] BRITISH ASSOCIATION MEETING}. 159 to the countenance and attempted authentication of the foolish dreams of the practitioners of spiritualism, and similar chimeri- cal hypotheses. The natural tendency to a belief in the marvel- lous is sufficient to explain the ready acceptance of such views by the ignorant ; and it is not improbable that a higher species of similar credulity may frequently act with persons of greater cul- tivation, if their scientific information has been of a partial kind. It must be admitted, further, that extremely curious and rare, and to those who are not acquainted with nervous phenomena, appa- rently marvellous phenomena, present themselves in peculiar states of the nervous system — some of which states may be induced through the mind and may be made more and more liable to re- cur, and greatly exaggerated by frequent repetition. But making the fullest allowance for all these conditions, it is surprising that persons otherwise appearing to be within the bounds of sanity, should entertain a confirmed belief in the possibility of phenomena, which, while they are at variance with the best established physi- cal laws, have never been brought under proof by the evidences of the senses, and are opposed to the dictates of sound judgment. It is so far satisfactory in the interests of true biological science that no man of note can be named from the long list of thoroughly well-informed anatomists and physiologists, who has not treated the belief in the separate existence of powers of animal magnet- ism and spiritualism as wild speculations, devoid of all foundation in the carefully tested observation of facts. It has been the habit of the votaries of the systems to which I have referred to assert that scientific men have neglected or declined to investigate the phenomena with attention and candour ; but nothing can be far- ther from the truth than this statement. Not to mention the admirable reports of the early French academicians, giving the account of the negative result of an examination of the earlier mesmeric phenomena by men in every way qualified to pronounce judgment on their nature, I am aware that from time to time men of eminence, and fully competent, by their knowledge of biologi- cal phenomena, and their skill and accuracy in conducting scien- tific investigation, have made the most patient and careful exami- nation of the evidence placed before them by the professed believers and practitioners of so-called magnetic, phreno-magnetic, electro- biological, and spiritualistic phenomena ; and the result has been uniformly the same in all cases when they were permitted to secure conditions by which the reality of the phenomena, or the justice 160 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. of their interpretation, could be tested — viz., either that the ex- periments signally failed to educe the results professed, or that the experimenters were detected in the most shameless and deter- mined impostures. I have myself been fully convinced of this by repeated examinations. But were any guarantee required for the care, soundness, and efficiency of the judgment of men of science on these phenomena and views, I have only to mention, in the first place the revered name of Faraday, and in the next that of my life- long friend Dr. Sharpley, whose ability and candour none will dispute, and who I am happy to think, is here among us, ready from his past experience of such exhibitions, to bear his weighty testimony against all cases of Zeyi^a^WTi, or the like, which may be the last wonder of the day among the mesmeric or spirit tual pseudo-physiologists. The phenomena to which I have at present referred, be they false or real, are in great part dependent upon a natural principle of the human mind, placed, as it would appear, in dangerous alliance with certain tendencies of the nervous system. They ought not to be worked upon without the greatest caution, and they can only be fully understood by the accomplished physiologist who is also conversant with psychology. The ex- perience of the last hundred years tends to show that there will always exist a certain number of minds prone to adopt a belief in the marvellous and striking in preference to that which is easily understood and patent to the senses ; but it may be confidently expected that the diffusion of a fuller and more accurate knowledge of vital phenomena among the non-scientific classes of the commu- nity may lead to a juster appreciation of the phenomena in ques- tion, and a reduction of the number among them who are believ- ers in the impossible. As for men of science who persist in sub- mitting to such strange perversion of judgment, we can only hope that the example of their less instructed fellow-countrymen may lead them to allow them themselves to be guided more directly by the principles of common sense than by the erratic tendencies of a too fervid imagination. Extracts from the President's (T. Andrews, F.R.S.) Address in the Chemical Section on the PROGRESS OF CHEMICAL RESEARCH. Proceeding to touch on questions of general chemistry at pre- sent attracting attention, the learned Professor spoke first of the No. 2.] BRITISH ASSOCIATION MEETING. 161 relations which subsist between the chemical composition and re- fractive power of bodies for light. He then proceeded — A happy modification of the ice calorimeter has been made by Bunsen. The principle of the method — to use as a measure of heat the change of volume which ice undergoes in melting — had already occurred to Herschel, and, as it now appears, still earlier to Her- mann ; but their observations had been entirely overlooked by physicists, and had led to no practical results. Bunsen has, in- deed, clearly pointed out that the success of the method depends upon an important condition, which is entirely his own. The ice to be melted must be prepared with water free from air, and must surround the source of heat in the form of a solid cylinder frozen artificially in situ. Those who have worked on the subject of heat know how difl&cult it is to measure absolute quantities with certainty, even where relative results of great accuracy may be ob- tained. The ice calorimeter of Bunsen will therefore be welcomed as an important addition to our means of research. Roscoe has prosecuted the photo-chemical investigations which Bunsen and he began some years ago. For altitudes above 10 degrees, the rela- tion between the sun's altitude and the chemical intensity of lio-ht is represented by a straight line. Till the sun has reached an al- titude of about 20 degrees, the chemical action produced by difi"u- sed daylight exceeds that of the direct sunlight ; the two actions are then balanced, and at higher elevations the direct sunlight is superior to the diffused light. The supposed inferiority of the chemical action of light under a tropical sun to its action in higher latitudes proves to be a mistake. According to Boscoe and Thorpe, the chemical intensity of light at Para, under the equator, in the month of April, is more than three times greater than at Kew in the month of August. Hunter has given a great extension to the earlier experiments of Saussure on the absorptive power of char- coal for gases. Cocoanut charcoal, according to Hunter's experi- ments, exceeds all other varieties of wood charcoal in absorptive power, taking up at ordinary pressures 170 volumes of ammonia and 69 of carbonic acid. Methylic alcohol is more largely ab- sorbed than any other vapour at temperatures from 90*^ to 127^^, but at 159^^ the absorption of ordinary alcohol exceeds it. Cocoa- nut charcoal absorbs 44 times its volume of the vapour of water at 127^. The absorptive power is increased by pressure. Last year two new processes for improving the manufacture of chlorine at- tracted the attention of the section ; one of them has already proved Vol. VI. c No. 2. 162 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. to be a success, and I am glad to be able to state that Mr. Deacon has recently overcome certain difficulties in his method, and has obtained a complete absorption of the chlorine. May we hope to see oxygen prepared by a cheap and continuous process from at- mospheric air ? With baryta the problem can be solved very per- fectly, if not economically. Another process is that of Tessier de Mothay, in which the manganate of potassium is decomposed by a current of superheated steam, and afterwards revived by being heated in a current of air. A company has lately been formed in New York to apply this process to the production of a brilliant house light. A compound Argand burner is used, having a double row of apertures — the inner row is supplied with oxygen, the other with coal gas or other combustible. The applications of pure oxygen, if it could be procured cheaply, would be very numerous, and few discoveries would more amply reward the inventor. Among other uses, it might be applied to the production of ozone, free from nitric acid by the action of the electrical discharge, and to the introduction of that singular body in an efficient form into the arts as a bleaching and oxidising agent. Tessier de Mothay has also proposed to prepare hydrogen gas on the large scale by heat- ing hydrate of lime with anthracite. We learn from the history of metallurgy that the valuable alloy which copper forms with zinc was known and applied long before zinc itself was discovered. Nearly the same remark may be made at present with regard to manganese and its alloys. The metal is difficult to obtain, and has not in the pure state been applied to any useful purpose ; but its alloys with copper and other metals have been prepared, and some of them are likely to be of great value. The alloy with zinc and copper is used as a substitute for German silver, and possesses some advantages over it. Not less important is the alloy of iron and manganese prepared according to the process of Hen- derson, by reducing in a Siemens' furnace a mixture of carbonate of manganese and oxide of iron. It contains from 20 to 80 per cent, of manganese, and will doubtless replace to a large extent the spiegeleism now used in the manufacture of Bessemer steel. The classical researches of Roscoe have made us acquainted for the first time with metallic vanadium. Berzelius obtained brilliant scales which he supposed to be the metal, by heating oxychloride in ammonia, but they have proved to be a nitride. Roscoe prepared the metal by reducing its chloride in a current of hydrogen, as a light gray powder, with a metallic lustre under the microscope. It has a remarkable affinity both for nitrogen and silicon. Like phos- No. 2.] BRITISH ASSOCIATION MEETING. 163 phorus, it is a pentad, and the vanadates correspond in composition to the phosphates, but differ in the order of stability at ordinary temperatures, the soluble tribasic salts being less stable than the tetrabasic compounds. Sainte Claire Deville, in continuation of his researches on dissociation, has examined the conditions under which vapour of water is decomposed by metallic iron. The iron, main- tained at a constant temperature, but varying in different experi- ments, from 150*^ C. to 1600° C, was exposed to the action of, the vapour of water of known tension. It was found that for a given temperature the iron continued to oxidise till the tension of the hydrogen formed reached an invariable value. In these ex- periments, as Deville remarks, the iron behaves as if it emitted a vapour (hydrogen), obeying the laws of hygometry. An inter- esting set of experiments has been made by Lothian Bell on the power possessed by spongy metallic iron of splitting up carbonic oxide into carbon and carbonic acid, the former being deposited in the iron. A minute quantity of oxide of iron is always formed in this reaction. In organic chemistry, the labours of chemists have been of late birgely directed to a group of hydrocarbons, which were first discovered among the products of the destructive distillation of coal or oil. The central body round which these researches have chiefly turned is benzol, whose discovery will al- ways be associated with the name of Faraday. Baeyer has pre- pared artificially picoline, a base isomeric with aniline, and dis- covered by Anderson in his very able researches on the Pyridine series. Of the two methods described by Baeyer, one is founded on an experiment of Simpson, in which a new base was obtained by heating tribromallyl with an alcoholic solution of ammonia. By pushing further the action of the heat, Baeyer succeeded in expelling the whole of the bromine from Simpson's base, in the form of hydrobromic acid, and in obtaining picoline. The same chemist has also prepared artificially collidine, another base of the Pyridine series. In this list of remarkable synthetical dis- coveries, another of the highest interest has lately been added by Schifi" — the preparation of artificial coniine. He obtained it by the action of ammonia on butyric aldehyde. The artificial base has the same composition as coniine prepared from hemlock. It is a liquid of an amber-yellow colour, having the characteristic odour and nearly all the usual reactions of ordinary coniine. Its physiological properties, so far as they have been examined, agree with those of coniine from hemlock, but the artificial base has not yet been obtained in large quantity, nor perfectly pure. 164 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. Valuable papers on alizarine have been published by Perkin and Scliunk. The latter has described a new acid — the anthraflaric — which is formed in the artificial preparation of alizarine. Madder contains another colouring principle, purpurine, which, like alizarine, yields anthracene when acted on by reducing agents, and has also been prepared artificially. These colouring princi- ples may be distinguished from one another, as Stokes has shown, by their absorption bands ; and Perkin has lately confirmed by this optical test the interesting observation of Schunk that fin- ished madder prints contain nothing but pure alizarine in combi- nation with the mordaunt employed. Hofmann has achieved another triumph in a department of chemistry which he has made peculiarly his own. In 1857, he showed that alcohol bases, analogous to those derived from ammonia, could be obtained by replacement from phosphuretted hydrogen, but he failed in his attempts to prepare the two lower derivatives. These missing links he has now supplied, and has thus established a complete parallelism between the derivatives of ammonia and of phosphu- retted hydrogen. The same able chemist has lately described the aromatic cyanates, of which one only — the phenylic cyanate — was previously known, having been discovered about twenty years ago by Hofmann himself. He now prepares this compound by the action of phosphoric anhydride on phenylurethane, and by a similar method he has obtained the tolylic, xylylic, and napthylic cyanates. Stenhouse had observed many years ago that, when aniline is added to furfurol, the mixture becomes rose-red, and communicates a fugitive red stain to the skin, and also to linen and silk. He has lately resumed the investigation of this sub- ject, and has obtained two new bases — furfuraniline and furfur- tolnidine — which like rosaniline, form beautifully coloured salts, although the bases themselves are nearly colourless, or of a pale brown colour. The interesting work of Dewar on the oxi- dation of picoline must not be passed over without notice. By the action of the permanganate of potassium on that bod^?, he has obtained a new acid, which bears the same relation to pyri- dine that phthalic acid does to benzol. Thorpe and Young have published a preliminary notice of some results of great promise which they have obtained by exposing paraffin to a high temper- ature in closed vessels. By this treatment it is almost completely resolved into liquid hydrocarbons whose boiling points range from 18° C. to 300° C. Those boiling under 100° have been exam- ined, and consist chiefly of olefines. In connection with this No. 2.] BRITISH ASSOCIATION MEETING. 165 subject, it may be interesting to recal the experiments of Pelouze and Cahours on the Pennsylvanian oils, which proved to be a mixture of carbolizdrogers belonging to the marsh gas series. An elaborate exposition of Berthelot's method of transforming an organic compound into a hydrocarbon containing a maximum of hydrogen, has appeared in a connected form. The organic body is heated, in a sealed tube with a large excess of a strong solution of hydriodic acid, to the temperature of 275°. The pressure in these experiments Berthelot estimates at 100 atmos- pheres, but apparently without having made any direct measure- ments. He has thus prepared ethyl hydride from alcohol, alde- hyde, &c., hexyl hydride from benzol. Berthelot has submitted both wood charcoal and coal to the reducing action of hydriodic acid, and among other interesting results, he claims to have ob- tained in this way oil of petroleum. By the action of chloride of zinc upon codeia, Matthiessen and Burnside have obtained apocodeia, which stands to codeia in the same relation as apomor- phia to morphia, an atom of water being abstracted in its forma- tion. Apocodeia is more stable than apomorphia ; but the action of reagents upon the two bases is very similar. As regards their physiological action, the hydrochlorate of apocodeia is a mild emetic, while that of apomorphia is an emetic of great activity. Other bases have been obtained by Wright by the action of hydrobromic acid on codeia. In two of these bases, bromotetra- codeia and chlorotetra-codeia, four molecules of codeia are welded together, so that they contain no less than seventy-two atoms of carbon. They have a bitter taste, but little physiological action. The authors of these valuable researches were indebted to Messrs. Macfarlane for the precious material upon which they operated. We are indebted to Crum Brown and Fraser for an important work on a subject of great practical, as well as theoretical, inte- rest— the relation between chemical constitution and physiological action. It has long been known that the ferrocyanide of potas- sium does not act as a poison on the animal system ; and Bunsen has shown that the kakodylic acid, an arsenical compound, is also inert. Crum Brown and Fraser found that the methyl compounds of strychnia-brucia and thebaia are much less active poisons than the alcoloids themselves; and the character of their physiological action is also different. The hypnotic action of the sulphate of methyl-morphium is less than that of morphia. But a reverse result occurs in the case of atropia, whose methyl and ethyl deri- vatives are much more poisonous than the salts of atropia itself. 166 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. THE POST PLIOCENE GEOLOGY OF CANADA, By J. W. DAWSON, LL.D., F.R.S., F.G.S. PART II. — LOCAL DETAILS. Before entering into the special consideration of this Second Part of the subject, I desire to call attention to some additional facts bearing on two of the most remarkable properties of the Post-pliocene deposits of the Northern Hemisphere, namely their general similarity of arrangement, and their local diversities. In the first part of this memoir, taking the Post-pliocene of the Lower St. Lawrence as a type, I showed that it has its paral- lel, with but slight general diiFerence, in the wide-spread superficial deposits of the interior of North America surrounding the great lakes, and that the Post-pliocene deposits of Scotland and Scan- ditiavia almost precisely resemble those of Canada in the general sequence of deposits. Since that part was published, additional illustrations have been afforded by papers in the Geological Maga- zine by Mr. Hull, and Mr. Mackintosh, by papers and discussions on the Eskers of Ireland, at the meeting of the British Associa- tion, and by an able monograph on the Estuary of the Forth, by Mr. David Milne Home. Mr. Hull, who is a " Land Glacia- list," arranges the deposits of the Drift Period in the British area in the following three groups, in descending order, in accordance with Prof. Ramsay's observations in England, and his own in Ireland. 1. Upper Boulder-clay, which he regards as " generally mar- ine." In Canada, this is represented by the loose boulders and partial boulder deposits of the Upper Saxicava Sand. 2. Shelly marine sands and gravels belonging to the greatest depression of the land, and representing our Saxicava Sand and Leda Clay. 3. Lower Boulder-clay, which represents the true or principal Boulder-clay of Canada. This Mr. Hull attributes " chiefly to land ice." In Ireland, it would thus seem that the principal sub-divisions of the Post-pliocene can be recognized, and Mr. Kinahan has described the remarkable ridges of gravel called eskers which run No. 2.] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 167 across the country in a North-east and South-west direction. Like our Canadian eskers or " Boar's backs," they are now admitted to be of marine origin, and are attributed to current action and to the waves, though floating ice has no doubt, as in Canada, contri- buted in some cases to their formation. Mr. Milne Home gives a graphic description of the Post-plio- cene deposits in the neighbourhood of the Frith of Forth, and many of his numerous sections might have just as well been taken from Canadian deposits. He thus sums up the causes of the phe- ' nomena, assuming that at the beginning of the period the land was submerged. " The ocean over and around Scotland was full of icebero-s and shore ice, which spread fragments of rocks over the sea bottom and often stranded, ploughing through beds of mud, sand, gravel, and blocks of stone, and mingling them together in such a way as to form the ' Boulder-clay.' The land thereafter gradually emerged, during which time the long ridges or embankments of gravel called 'kames' were formed." Mr. Mackintosh's observations go mainly to show that in Eng- land, as in Canada, even the lower drift and rock striation are due to a great extent to floating ice and not to glaciers, and he extends this conclusion even into the lake district of England. It is also worthy of remark that the long-received doctrine that glaciers are powerful eroding agents, which the author showed in a paper in this journal, in 1866, to be without foundation, is only now beginning to be discredited in England. I shall refer to this in the sequel, and in the meantime may direct attention to an in- teresting paper on the subject by Mr. Bonney, F.Gr.S., in the Journal of the Geological Society for August, 1871. It would further appear that, after the glacial period, in the Post-glacial, the British land rose to a level higher than that which it at present exhibits, then sunk again, and re-emerged in the modern period. Evidences of this later submergence have not been recognized in Canada, but in the inland area they have been detected by Hilgard and by Andrews. Since the publication of the first part of this memoir. Prof. Hilgard has discussed the subject of the southern drifts of the Mississippi valley at the meeting of the American Association at IndianajDolis ; and I am indebted to that gentleman and to Prof. Andrews, of Chicago, for much information on these deposits and their relation to those of more northern regions. 168 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. It appears that the oldest Post-pliocene deposit in the south is that called by Prof. Hilgard the " Orange Sand." This deposit is spread over the States of Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, and parts of Louisiana, Kentucky, and Arkansas, and in some places attains an elevation of 700 feet. It contains water-worn frag- ments of northern rocks, and is supposed by Prof. Hilgard to have been deposited by rapid currents of water, possibly fresh, as the deposit contains no marine fossils. Above this, according to Prof. Hilgard, is found in places a swamp, lagoon or estuary formation designated the " Port Hudson group." Succeeding this is the " Bluff or Loess " group, a deposit of fine silt, limited almost or entirely to the Valley of the Missi- sippi. Its maximum thickness is seventy-five feet. On this rests a very widely distributed bed, the " Yellow Loam," not more than twenty feet thick, but much more exten- sively distributed laterally than the former, and reaching an ele- vation of 700 feet. Under the names of "Second Bottoms or Hummocks," and " First Bottoms," are known terraced deposits of clay belonging to the present river valleys, but indicating in the case of the Second Bottoms a greater amount of water than at present. It is obvious that all of the above are aqueous deposits, and there seems to be no evidence whatever in the region referred to, of the action of land ice, though the stones and few boulders in the Orange sand are very probably due to floating ice. There seems reason to believe that the Orange sand is continuous with the Boulder-drift of the north-west ; and if this is, as stated by Newberry and others, a later deposit than the Erie clay, then it is probable that no representative of the latter exists to the south- west, or that the Orange sand represents the whole of the northern deposits. In any case it represents northern currents of water, though whether salt water admitted by the depression of the land, or fresh water resulting from the melting of glaciers, it is not easy to decide, as very great difficulties attend either view in the present state of our knowledge of the deposit. What- ever the conditions of deposit of the Orange sand, it would seem to have been succeeded by a land surface, and this by a depression to the extent of 700 feet or more, before the modern elevation of the land. If this last elevation corresponds with that of the terraces of the St. Lawrence, then the former one must have occurred in the St. Lawrence valley in the interval No. 2.] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 169 between the deposit of the Leda clay and the close of the Post- pliocene. This question we shall have occasion to consider in the sequel, in connection with the second depression of the European land above referred to. Since the publication of the first of these papers, Dr. Newberry has kindly sent me a paper of his published as early as 1862, in which he states the remarkable fact, quoted above from his more recent Report on Ohio, that the drainage of the great lake basins, open in the early Post-pliocene period, was obstructed by the gla- cial deposits, and has been only partially restored. He also desires me to state that he refers the old drainage not exclusively to the action of glaciers, but to the " ice period, or an earlier epoch." I am happy to make .these corrections; the latter more especially, as it brings our theoretical views more into harmony. Dr. Newberry, however, for whose conclusions on such subjects I have the highest respect, still, in his latest expressions of opinion, adheres to the action of land ice in producing the glacial striation, which from his descriptions is, I should suppose, quite as definite and strongly marked as that in the St. Lawrence valley. The grand series of Post-pliocene changes was thus uniform in Europe and America, pointing to great general causes of subsi- dence and re-elevation ; but locally there is the most extreme irregularity in these deposits, giving great uncertainty to their arrangement. Some of these difi'erences we shall have occasion to notice under the following geographical subdivisions. 1. Newfoundland and Labrador. In the Journal of the Geological Society of London, for Feb- ruary, 1871, is a communication from Staff-commander Kerr, R. N., of the Coast Survey, in which he gives the directions of twenty- eight examples of grooved and scratched surfaces observed in the southern part of Newfoundland. The course of the majority of these is N.E. and S.W., ranging from N.8" E. to N. 64° E. The remainder are N.W. and S.E.,most of them with a predomi- nating Easterly direction. Boulders are mentioned, but no marine beds. The author refers the glaciation to land ice, supposing certain submerged banks across the mouths of the bays to be terminal moraines. The latest information on the Post-pliocene of Labrador is that given in a paper by Dr. Packard in the memoirs of the Boston Society 170 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Yol. vi. of Natural History for 1867. The deposits are said to consist of boulders, Leda clay and sand, and raised beaches, which, on the authority of Prof. Hind, are stated to reach an elevation of 1200 feet above the sea. The hills to a height of 2500 feet are roun- ded as if by ice action. Some higher hills present a frost-shat- tered surface at their summits. No directions of striae are given, and they appear to be rare. Mr. Campbell, author of '' Frost and Fire," mentions examples with course N. 45^ E. in the Strait of Belle Isle. It is remarkable that true Boulder-clay is rare in Labrador, though loose boulders are abundant in the valleys and on the inland table land. Dr. Packard attributes the absence of Boulder-clay to denudation. This may be the cause, but it is to be observed that, on that view of the origin of Boulder-clay which attributes it to ice-laden arctic currents, there must always have been in the course of such currents areas of denudation as well as areas of deposition, and an elevated table-land like that of Labra- dor, in a high northern latitude, may well have been of the former character. The Leda clay occurs in several places. In 1860, 1 published a list of species collected by Capt. Orlebar; and Packard has greatly added to the number, giving a list which will be referred to farther on. Dr. Packard very truly remarks that the fauna of the Labrador clays is very similar to that now found on the coast, and called by him the Syrtensian fauna. In the latter we have a few southern forms, absent in the clay, but this is all. Further, the Labrador Post-pliocene fauna is identical or nearly so with that of similar deposits in South Greenland, described by MoUer and Rink. Thus the climatal conditions of the arctic current on the coast of Labrador seem to have in no respect diifered in the Post-pliocene from those which obtain at present. The I^eda clay with its chariicteristic fossils is found as high as 500 feet above the level of the sea. Raised beaches and terraces, whethei'cut into sand and clay or the hard metamorphic rocks of the coast, are as common in Lab- rador as alono; the shores of the River St. Lawrence. Their precise altitudes are not given, but they appear to be very nume- rous and to rise to a great height above the sea. One feature of some interest is their consisting in some places of large stones and boulders, evidencing very powerful action of coast ice and currents. Packard speaks of many of these beaches as moraines modified by the sea, but he gives no reason for this except the general No. 2.] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 171 belief that extensive glaciers existed in Labrador in the Post-plio- cene, of which, however, there seems little direct evidence. From the descriptions of Prof. Hind,* however, it would seem that traces of local glaciers in the river valleys, similar to those referred to above in the case of the Saguenay and the Murray River, exist, and these might now be restored by a slight increase of cold and a moderate elevation of the land. On the island of Anticosti, Messrs. Hyatt, Verrill and Shaler found Saxicava arctica in clay at an elevation of fifteen feet above the level of the sea. Before proceeding up the St. Lawrence Valley into Canada proper, I may cross to the south side of the Gulf of St. Lawrence and notice the drift deposits of Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, and their connection with those of the State of Maine. 2. Prince Edward Island. The Triassic and Upper Carboniferous rocks of this island consist almost entirely of red sandstones, and the country is low and un- dulating;, its hi2:hest eminences not exceeding 400 feet. The prevalent Post-pliocene deposit is a Boulder-clay, or in some places boulder loam, composed of red sand and clay derived from the waste of the red sandstones. This is filled with boulders of red sandstone derived from the harder beds. They are more or less rounded, often glaciated, with striae in the direction of their longer axis, and sometimes polished in a remarkable manner, when the softness and coarse character of the rock are considered. This polishing must have been effected by rubbing with the sand and loam in which they are embedded. These boulders are not usually large, though some were seen as much as five feet in length. The boulders in this deposit are almost universally of the native rock, and must have been produced by the grinding of ice on the outcrops of the harder beds. In the eastern and middle portion of the Island, only these native rocks were seen in the clay, with the exception of pebbles of quartzite which may have been derived from the Tri- assic conglomerates. At Campbellton, in the western part of the Island, I observed a bed of Boulder-clay filled with boulders of metamorphic rocks similar to those of the mainland of New Brunswick. * Trans. Gtol. Society, 1864. 172 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. Striae were seen only in one place on the North-eastern coast and at another on the South-western. In the former case their direction was nearly S.W. and N.E. In the latter it was S. 70° E. No mariilie remains were observed in the Boulder-clay ; but at Campbellton, above the Boulder-clay already mentioned, there is a limited area occupied with beds of stratified sand and gravel, at an elevation of about fifty feet above the sea, and in one of the beds there are shells of Tellina Grcenlandica. On the surface of the country, more especially in the western part of the island, there are numerous travelled boulders, sometimes of considerable size. As these do not appear in situ in the Boul- der-clay, they may be supposed to belong to a second or newer boulder drift similar to that which we shall find to be connected with the Saxicava sand in Canada. These boulders being of rocks foreign to Prince Edward Island, the question of their source be- comes an interesting one. With reference to this, it may be stated in general terms, that the majority are Granite, Syenite, Diorite, Felsite. Porphyry, Quartzite and coarse slates, all identical in mineral character with those which occur in the metamorphic districts of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, at distances of from 50 to 200 miles to the South and South-west; though some of them may have been derived from Cape Breton on the East. It is further to be observed that these boulders are most abun- dant and the evidences of denudation of the Trias greatest in that part of the Island which is opposite the deep break between the hills of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, occupied by the Bay of Fundy, Chiegnecto Bay and the low country extending thence to Northumberland Strait, an evidence that this boulder drift was connected with currents of water passing up this depression from the South or South-west. Besides these boulders, however, there are others of a different character ; such as Gneiss, Hornblende schist, Anorthosite and La- bradorite rock, which must have been derived from the Laurentian rocks of Labrador and Canada, distant 250 miles or more, to the Northward. These Laurentian rocks are chiefly found on the North side of the island, as if at the time of their arrival the island formed a shoal, at the North side of which the ice carrying the boulders grounded and melted away. With re- ference to these boulders, it is to be observed that a depression of four or five hundred feet would open a clear passage for the arctic current entering the Straits of Belle Isle, to- No. 2,] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 173 the Bay of Fundy ; and that heavy ice carried by this current would then ground on Prince Edward Island, or be carried across it to the Southward. If the Laurentian boulders came in this way, their source is probably 400 miles distant in the Strait of Belle Isle. On the North shore of Prince Edward Island, except where occupied by sand dunes, the beach shows great numbers of peb- bles and small boulders of Laurentian rocks. These are said by the inhabitants to be cast up by the sea or pushed up by the ice in spring. Whether they are now being drifted by ice direct from the Labrador coast, or are old drift being washed up from the bottom of the gulf, which north of the island is very shallow, does not appear. They are all much rounded by the waves, differing in this respect from the majority of the boulders found inland. The older Boulder-clay of Prince Edward Island, with native boulders, must have been produced under circumstances of power- ful ice-action, in which comparatively little transport of material from a distance occurred. If we attribute this to a sclacier, then as Prince Edward Island is merely a slightly raised portion of the bottom of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, this can have been no other than a gio-antic mass of ice filling the whole basin of the gulf, and without any slope to give it movement except toward the centre of this great though shallow depression. On the other hand, if we attribute the Boulder-clay to floating ice, it must have been produced at a time when numerous heavy bergs were disengaged from what of Labrador was above water, and when this was too thoroughly enveloped in snow and ice to afford many travelled stones. Farther, that this Boulder-clay is a sub- marine and not a subaerial deposit, seems to be rendered probable by the circumstance that many of the boulders of sandstone are so soft that they crumble immediately when exposed to the wea- ther and frost. The travelled boulders lying on the surface of the Boulder-clay evidently belong to a later period, when the hills of Labrador and Nova Scotia were above water, though lower than at present, and were sufl&ciently bare to furnish large supplies of stones to coast ice carried by the tidal currents sweeping up the coast, or by the Arctic current from the North, and deposited on the surface of Prince Edward Island, then a shallow sand-bank. The sands with sea-shells prob.ibly belonged to this period, or perhaps to the later part of it, when the land was gradually rising. Prince 174 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. Edward Island thus appears to have received boulders from both sides of the gulf of St, Lawrence during the later Post-pliocene period ; but the greater number from the South side, perhaps be- cause nearer to it. It thus furnishes a remarkable illustration of the transport of travelled stones at this period in different directions, and in the comparative absence of travelled stones in the lower Boulder -clay, it furnishes a similar illustration of the homogeneous and untravelled character of that deposit, in circum- stances where the theory of floating ice serves to account for it, at least as well as that of land-ice, and in my judgment greatly better. 3. Nova Scotia and New Brunsicich. [n these Provinces the circumstances are entirely different from those in Prince Edward Island, the country consisting of Carboni- ferous and Triassic plains, with ranges of older hills, often meta- morphic, and attaining elevations of 1200 feet or more. It may, perhaps, be best in the first instance to present a summary of the phenomena, as I have given them in my Acadian Greology, and to add such additional facts and inferences as the present state of the subject may require. The beds observed may be arranged as follows, in descending order. 1 . Gravel and sand beds, and ancient gravel ridges and beaches, indicating the action of shallow water, and strong currents and waves. Travelled boulders occur in connection with these beds. 2. Stratified clay with shells, showing quiet deposition in deeper water. 3. Unstratified Boulder-clay, indicating, probably, the united action of ice and water. 4. Peaty deposits, belonging to a land surface preceding the deposit of the Boulder-clay. As the third of these iormations is the most important and generally diffused in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, we shall attend to it first, and notice the relation of the others to it. The Unstratified Drift or Boulder clay varies from a stiff clay to loose sand, and its composition and colour generally depend upon those of the underlying and neighbouring rocks. Thus, over sandstone it is arenaceous, over shales argillaceous, and over conglomerates and hard slates pebbly or shingly. The greater No. 2.] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 175 number of the stones contained in the drift are usually, like the paste containing them, derived from the neighbouring rock for- mations. These untravelled fragments are often of large size, and are usually angular, except when they are of very soft mate- rial, or of rocks whose corners readily weather away. It is easy to observe, that on passing from a granite district to one composed of slate, or from slate to sandstone, the character of the loose stones changes accordingly. It is also a matter of ftimiliar obser- vation, that in proportion to the hardness or softness of the pre- vailing rocks, the quantity of these loose stones increases or dimi- nishes. In some of the quartzite and granite districts of the Atlantic coast, the surface seems to be heaped with boulders with only a little soil in their interstices, and every little field, cleared with immense labour, is still half-filled with huge white masses popularly known as "elephants." On the other hand, in the districts of soft sandstone and shale, one may travel some distance without seeing a boulder of considerable size. The boulders are as usual often glaciated or marked with ice-striae. Though the more abundant fragments are untravelled, it by no means follows that they are undisturbed. They have been lifted from their original beds, heaped upon each other in every variety of position, and intermixed with sand and clay, in a manner which shows convincingly that the sorting action of running water had nothing to do with the matter ; and this applies not only to stones of moderate size, but to masses of ten feet or more in diameter. In some of the carboniferous districts where the Boulder-clay is thick, as for example, near Pictou Harbour, it is as if a gigantic harrow had been dragged over the surface, tear- ing up the outcrops of the beds, and mingling their fragments in a rude and unsorted mass. Besides the untravelled fragments, the drift always contains boulders derived from distant localities, to which in many cases we can trace them ; and I may mention a few instances of this to show how extensive has been this transport of detritus. In the low country of Cumberland there are few boulders, but of the few that appear some belong to the hard rocks of the Cobe- quid hills to the Southward ; others may have been derived from the somewhat similar hills of New Brunswick. On the summits of the Cobequid hills and their Northern slopes, we find angular fragments of the sandstones of the plain below, not only drifted from their original sites, but elevated several hundreds of fee 176 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. above them. To the Southward and Eastward of the Cobequids, throughout Colchester, Northern Hants, and Pictou, fragments from these hills, usually much rounded, are the most abundant travelled boulders, showing that there has been great driftage from this elevated tract. Near the town of Pictou, where a thick bed of a sandy boulder deposit occurs, this is filled with large masses of sandstone derived from the outcrops of the beds on higher ground to the north ; but with these are groups of travel- led stones often in the lower part of the mass. Near the steam ferry wharf, in the town of Pictou, I observed one such group, consisting of the following, all large boulders and lying close to- gether— two of red syenite, six of gray granite, one of compact grey felsite, one of hard conglomerate, two of hard grit. The two last were probably Lower Carboniferous, the others derived from the altered Silurian deposits. All may have been drifted by one berg or ice-floe from the flanks of the Cobequid range of hills. In like manner, the long ridge of trap rocks, extending from Cape Blomidon to Briar Island, has sent off great quantities of boul- ders across the sandstone valley which bounds it on the South and up the slopes of the slate and granite hills to the Southward of this valley. Well characterized fragments of trap from Blomi- don may be seen near the town of Windsor ; and I have seen un- mistakeable fragments of similar rock from Digby neck, on the Tusket Biver, thirty miles from their original position. On the other hand, numerous boulders of granite have been carried to the Northward from the hills of Annapolis, and deposited on the slopes of the opposite trappean ridge ; and some of them have been carried round its Eastern end, and now lie on the shores of Lon- donderry and Onslow. So also, while immense numbers of boul- ders have been scattered over the South coast from the granite and quartz rock ridges immediately inland, many have drifted in the opposite direction, and may be found scattered over the coun- ties of Antigonish, Pictou, and Colchester. These facts show that the transport of travelled blocks, though it may here as in other parts of America, have been principally from the Northward, has by no means been exclusively so ; boulders having been car- ried in various directions, and more especially from the more ele- vated and rocky districts to the lower grounds in their vicinity. Professor Hind has shown the existence of a similar relation be- tween the boulders of New Brunswick and the hilly ranges of that country. No. 2.] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 177 The following are the directions of the diluvial scratches in a number of localities in different parts of Nova Scotia : — Point Pleasant and other places near Halifax, exposure south, very dis- tinct stri^, . . . S. 20° E. to S. 30° E. Head of the Basin, exposure south, but in a valley, . . . E. & W. nearly. La IJave River, exposure S.E., . S. 20° W. Petite River, exposure S. . . S. 20° E. Bear River, exposure N., . S. 30° E. Rawdon, exposure N., . . S. 25° E. The Gore Mountain, exposure N., two sets of stri^, respectively, . S. 65° E. & S. 20° E. Windsor Road, exposure not noted, S.S.E. G-ay's River, ex^Dosure N., . Nearly S. & N. Musquodoboit Harbour, exposure S., Nearly S. & N. NearPictou, exposure E., in a valley. Nearly E. & W. Poison's Lake, summit of a ridge, . Nearly N. & S. Near Guysboro', exposure not noted, Nearly S. & N. Sydney Mines, Cape Breton, expo- sure S S. 30° W.* The above instances show a tendency to a Southerly and South- easterly direction, which accords with the prevailing course in most parts of North-eastern America. Local circumstances have, however, modified this prevailing direction ; and it is interesting to observe that, while S.E. is the prevailing direction in Acadia and New England, it is exceptional in the St. Lawrence valley, where the prevailing direction is S.W. Professor Hind has given a table of similar striation in New Brunswick, showinc: that the direction ranges from N. 10° W. to N. 30° E., in all except a very few cases. On Blue Mountains, 1650 feet above the sea, it is stated to be N. and S. As in Nova Scotia, N. W. and S. E. seems to be the prevailing course. In a paper published in the Canadian Naturalist, Vol. VI., No. 1, Mr. Matthew gives a table of striation in the southern part of New Brunswick, in which the South-east direction is decidedly predominant, though there are also some in the South west direction. In this paper will also be found many interesting facts as to the Boulder-clay of NewBruns- * The above courses are magnetic, the average variation being about 18° W. Vol. VI. D No. 2. 178 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST, [Vol. vi. wick, though the agency of a continental glacier is invoked to explain some fjicts which in the sequel we shall find to admit of a different interpretation. The travelled and un travelled boulders are usually intermixed in the drift. In some instances, however, the former Jippear to be most numerous near the surface of the mass, and their hori- zontal distribution is also very irregular. In examining coast sections of the drift, we may find for some distance a great abun- dance of angular blocks, with few travelled boulders, or both varie- ties are equally intermixed, or travelled boulders prevail; and we may often observe particular kinds of these last grouped together, as, for instance, a number of blocks of granite, greenstone, syen- ite, etc., all lying together, as if they had been removed from their original beds and all deposited together at one operation. On the surface of the country where the woods have been removed, this arrangement is sometimes equally evident ; thus hundreds of granite boulders may be seen to cumber one limited spot, while in its neighbourhood they are comparatively rare. It is also well known to the farmers in the more rocky districts, that many spots which appear to be covered with boulders have, when these are removed, a layer of soil comparatively free from stones beneath. These appearances may in some instances result from the action of currents of water, which have in spots carried off the sand or clay, leaving the boulders behind ; but in many cases this is mani- festly the original arrangement of the material, the superficial layer of boulders belonging to a more recent driftage than that of the underlying mass in which boulders are often much less abun- dant. Boulders or travelled stones are often found in places where there is no other drift. For example, on bare granite hills, about 500 feet in height, near St. Mary's River, there are large angular blocks of quartzite, derived from the ridges of that material which abound in the district, but which are separated from the hills on which the fragments lie by deep valleys. In Nova Scotia I have observed no beds with marine shells, though the Boulder-clay is often covered with beds of stratified sand and gravel ; and the only evidence of organic life, during the boulder period, or immediately before it, that I have noticed, is a hardened peaty bed which appears under the Boulder-clay on the North-west arm of the River of Inhabitants in Cape Breton. It rests upon gray clay similar to that which underlies peat bogs. No. 2.] DAWSON — POST- PLIOCENE. 179 and is overlaid by nearly twenty feet of Boulder-clay. Pressure has rendered it nearly as hard as coal, though it is somewhat tougher and more earthy than good coal. It has a shining streak, burns with considerable flame, and approaches in its characters to the brown coals or more imperfect varieties of bituminous coal. It contains many small roots and branches, apparently of conifer- ous trees allied to the spruces. The vegetable matter composing this bed must have flourished before the drift was spread over the surftice. In New Brunswick, stratified clays holding marine shells have been found overlying the Boulder -clay, or in connexion with it, especially in the Southern part of the Province, where deposits of this kind occur similar to those found in Canada and in Maine, though apparently on a smaller scale. These deposits, as they occur near St. John, consist of gray and reddish clays, holding fossils which indicate moderately deep water, and are, as to species, identical with those occurring in similar deposits in Canada and in Maine. They would indicate a somewhat lower temperature than that of the waters of the Bay of Fundy at present, or about that of the Northern part of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. In Bailey's Report on the G-eology of Southern New Brunswick, Professor Harlt has given a list of the fossils of these beds, as seen at Lawlor's Lake, Duck Cove, and St. John, which I re_ published with some additions in Acadian Geology. These New Brunswick beds are strictly continuous with, and equivalent to those which extend along the coast of New England, and thence ascend into the Valley of Lake Champlain, while on the other side they may be considered as perfectly representing in character and fossils the Leda clay of Eastern Canada. They are remarkably like both in mineral character and fossils to the Clyde beds of Scotland, which are probably their equivalents^ The points of resemblance of the Leda clay of the coast of Maine, and that of the St. Lawrence, and Labrador, were noticed by me in my paper of 1860, already referred to, and have been more fully brought out by Dr. .Packard, who describes the Leda clay as it occurs at several localities from Eastport to Cape Cod. Along this whole coast it retains its Labradoric or Gulf of St. Lawrence aspect, though with the introduction of some more Southern species, and the gradual failure of some more arctic forms. South of Cape Cod, as in the modern sea, the Post-plio. cene beds assume a much more Southern aspect in their fossils. / 180 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. VI. the boreal forms altogether disappearing. For a very full exhi- bition of these facts, I may refer to Dr. Packard's paper. The stratified sand and gravel of Nova Scotia rests upon and is newer than the Boulder-clay, and is also newer than the strati- fied marine clays above referred to. Its age is probably that of the Saxicava Sand of the St. Lawrence valley. The former rela- tion may often be seen in coast sections or river banks, and occa- sionally in road cuttings. I observed some years ago an instruc- tive illustration of this fact, in a bank on the shore a little to the Eastward of Merigomish harbour. At this place the lower part of the bank consists of clay and sand with angular stones, prin- cipally sandstones. Upon this rests a bed of fine sand and small rounded gravel with layers of coarser pebbles. The gravel is separated from the drift below by a layer of the same sort of an- gular stones that appear in the drift, showing that the currents which deposited the upper bed have washed away some of the finer portions of the drift before the sand and gravel were thrown down. In this section, as well as in most others that I have ex- amined, the lower part of the stratified gravel is finer than the upper part, and contains more sand. In some cases we can trace the pebbles of the gravels to ancient conglomerate rocks which have furnished them by their decay; but in other instances the pebbles may have been rounded by the waters that deposited them in their present place. In places, however, where old pebble rocks do not occur, we sometimes find, instead of gravel, beds of fine laminated sand. A very remark- able instance of the connexion of superficial gravels with ancient pebble rocks occurs in the county of Pictou. In the coal forma- tion of this count}^ there occurs a very thick bed of conglomerate, the outcrop of which, owing to its comparative hardness and great mass, forms a high ridge extending from the hill behind New Glasgow across the East and Middle Rivers, and along the South of the West River, and then, crossing the West River, re-appears in Rogers' Hill. The valleys of these three rivers have been cut through this bed, and the material thus removed has been heaped up in hillocks and beds of gravel, along the banks of the streams, on the side toward which the water now flows, which happens to be the North and North-east. Accordingly, along the course of the Albion Mines Railway and the lower parts of the Middle and West Rivers, these gravel beds are everywhere exposed in the road-cuttings, and may in some places be seen to rest on No. 2.] ' DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 181 the Boulder- clay, showing that the cutting of these valleys was completed after the drift was produced. Similar instances of the connexion of gravel with conglomerate occur near Antigonish, and on the sides of the Cobequid mountains, w^here some of the val- leys have at their Southern entrances immense tongues of gravel extending out into the plain, as if currents of enormous volume had swept through them from North to South. The stratified gravels do not, like the older drift, form a con- tinuous sheet spreading over the surface. They occur in mounds and lono: ridges, or eskers, sometimes extending' for miles over the country. One of the most remarkable of these ridges is the "Boar's Back," which runs along the West side of the Hebert River in Cumberland. It is a narrow ridge, perhaps from ten to twenty feet in height, and cut across in several places by the channels of small brooks. The ground on either side appears low and flat. For eiirht miles it forms a natural road. rouo;h in- deed, but practicable with care to a carriage, the general direction being nearly North and South. What its extent or course may be beyond the points where the road enters on and leaves it, I do not know ; but it appears to extend from the base of the Cobe- quid mountains to a ridge of sandstone that crosses the lower part of the Hebert river. It consists of o-ravel and sand, whether stratified or not I could not ascertain, with a few large boulders. Another very singular ridge of this kind is that running along the West side of Clyde river in Shelburne county. This ridge is higher than that on Hebert river, but, like it, extends parallel to the river, and forms a natural road, improved by art in such a manner as to be a very tolerable highway. Along a great part of its course it is separated from the river by a low alluvial flat, and on the land side a swamp intervenes between it and the higher ground. Shorter and more interrupted ridges of this kind may also be seen in the country Northward and Eastward of the town of Pictou. In sections they are seen to be stratified, and they generally occur on low or level tracts, and in places where if the country were submerged, the surf or marine currents and tides might be expected to throw up ridges. The presence of boulders shows that ice grounded on these ridges, and it, probably by its pressure, in some instances, modified their forms. These eskers, or " horse-backs," must not, however, be confounded with glacier moraines, to which in structure they bear no resemblance what- ever. D* 182 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. ' [Vol. VI. It is probably to this more modern part of the Post-pliocene, if not to a more recent period following the elevation of the land, that the bones of the mastodon found in Cape Breton, and des- cribed in " Acadian Geology," belong. For many additional facts relating to the Post-pliocene of New Brunswick, I may refer to the valuable paper by Mr. Matthew, already mentioned. 4. Lower St. Lawrence — North Side. Descriptions of the Post-pliocene deposits of this region are contained in several of my papers above cited, but I shall here give a summary of these, with the corrections and additional fjicts obtained within the past few years. Sagueiiay River. — I have already, in part first, referred to the glacial striation of this region, and perhaps no better example could be found of those lateral valleys along which ice seems to have been poured into the St. Lawrence from the North. The gorge of the Saguenay is a narrow and deep cut, running nearly N.W. and S.E., or at right angles to the course of the St. Law- rence, and of the Laurentian ridges. It extends inland more than forty-five miles, and then divides into two branches, one of which is occupied by the continuation of the river to Lake St. John, the other by Ha-Ha Bay and a valley at its head. In the lower part of its course, as far as Ha-Ha Bay, this gorge is from 50 to 140 fathoms deep, below the level of the tide in the St. Lawrence, and in some places the cliffs on its banks rise abruptly to 1 500 feet above the water level, so that its extreme depth is nearly 2400 feet, while its width varies from about a mile to a mile and a- half. The striated surfaces and the roches moutonnees seen in this gorge and on the hills on its sides, to a height of at least 300 feet, shew that in the glacial period a powerful stream of ice must have flowed down this gorge into the St. Lawrence, thouijh whe- O CD / ~ ther it was occupied by a glacier or constituted a fiord leading from one, like many in Greenland, or was a strait traversed by bergs, does not appear. Possibly, with different levels of the land, these conditions may have alternated. I cannot imagine anything more like what the Saguenay may have been at this time, than the view of Franz Joseph Fiord in East Greenland, brought home by the second German expedition to that country, in the present year,* and which, with other discoveries of that * Copied in the << Leisure Hour" for November, 1871. No. 2.] DAWSON — POST PLIOCENE. 183 expedition soon to be published by Dr. Petermann, will go far to re- move the prevailing error as to Greenland being covered with a universal glacier ; whereas it seems to be a rocky and mostly snow-clad country, wath very large glaciers in its valleys. The strikes of the gneiss on the opposite sides of the Saguenay indicate that it occupies a line of transverse fracture, constituting a weak portion of the Laurentian ridges, and this has evidently been smoothed and deepened by water and ice under conditions different from the present, in which it is probable that the chan- nel is being gradually filled with mud. Its excavation must have taken place before the deposition of the thick beds of marine clay (Leda clay) which appear near its mouth and in its tribu- taries, sometimes passing into Boulder-clay below, and capped by sand and gravel. It is indeed not improbable that in the later Post-pliocene it was in great part filled up with such deposits, which have been swept away in the course of the re-elevation of the land. At Tadoussac, at the mouth of the Saguenay, where the under- lying formation is the Laurentian gneiss, the Post-pliocene beds attain to great thickness, but are of simple structure and slightly fossiliferous. The principal part is a stratified sandy clay with few boulders, except in places near the ridges of Laurentian rocks, when it becomes filled with numerous rounded blocks and pebbles of gneiss. This forms high banks eastward of Tadoussac. It contains a few shells of Tellina Grcenlandica and Leda trnncata, and a little inland, at Bergeron River, it also contains Cardium Islaiidicum, Astarte dliptica, and Rhynclionella psittacea. It resembles some of the beds seen on the South side of the river St. Lawrence, and has also much of the aspect of the Leda clay, as developed in the valley of the Ottawa. On this clay there rest in places thick beds of yellow sand and gravel. At Tadoussac these deposits have been cut into a succession of terraces which are well seen near the hotel and old church. The lowest, near the shore, is about ten feet high ; the second, on which the hotel stands, is forty feet; the third is 120 to 150 feet in height, and is uneven at top. The highest, which consists of sand and gravel, is about 250 feet in height. Above this the country inland consists of bare Laurentian rocks. These terraces have been cut out of deposits, once more extensive, in the process of elevation of the land ; and the present flats off the mouth of the Saguenay, would form a similar terrace as wide as any of the others, if the country were to experience another elevatory move- 184 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. VI. ment. On the third terrace I observed a few large Laurentiau boulders, and some pieces of red and gray shale of the Quebec group, indicating the action of coast-ice when this terrace was cut. On the highest terrace there were also a few boulders; and both terraces are capped with pebbly sand and well rounded gravel, indic'itino- the lono;-continued action of the waves at the levels which they represent. Murray Bay, &c. — At Murray Bay, Petit Mai Bay, and Les Eboulements, as noticed above, the system of Post-pliocene ter- races is well developed. On the West side of Murray Bay, the Silurian rocks of White Point, immediately within the pier, form a steep cliff, in the middle of which is a terraced step marking an ancient sea level. At the end nearest the pier the sea has again cut back to the old cliff, leaving merely a narrow shelf; but toward the inner side this shelf rapidly expands into the sandy flat along which the main road runs, and which is continuous with the lower plain extending all the way to the head of the bay. In this flat the upper portion of the Post-pliocene deposit seems to consist principally of sand and gravel, resting on stony clay. In the former, which corresponds to the Saxicava sand of Montreal, I found only a few valves of Tellica G7'oenlandica which is still the most abundant shell on the modern beach. In the latter, corresponding to the Leda clay, which is best seen in some parts of the shore at low tide, I found a number of deep water shells of the following species, all of which, except Spirorbis spirillum and Aphrodite Grcenlandica , have been found in these deposits at Quebec and Montreal. Fusus tornatus. Trophon Scalarifo rme. Ma rgarifa helicina . Cylichna occulta. Pecten Islcmdicus. Tellina calcarea. Leda truncata. Saxicava rugosa. Aphrodite Groenlandica. Myfilus edulis. My a arenaria . Balanus Hameri. Spirorbis spirillum. S. vitrea. Serpula vermicularis. w 3 ■♦-' Pi >4 T ■" 'J ?i C; i-i^ ' -M <^C/i« Cl 5i s<::i U* c; o rd 2 oo '^ rf c ^ > 1 ^ 5C '-A -q^ 0^ % 3 GC o r/? -4— ' • H =i Oi ^^ rt ^— < O r^ ri VC 1— < &> rJ r— 1 ^ ^ i/iH ri i- vv^. 1 ^■:i^^^/r^ H -t3 f3 f -•■V\ll i '? f--v. H ? '/[ g: O ■^■ o re! R No. 2.] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 185 These shells imply a higher beach than that of this lower flat, which is not more than 30 feet above the present sea level. Ac- cordingly above this are several higher terraces, the heights of which on the west side of bay are given in Section I. The second principal terrace, which forms a steep bank of clay some distance behind the main road, is 116 feet in height, and is of considerable breadth, and has on its front in some places an im- perfect terrace at the height of 81 feet. It corresponds nearly in height with the shoulder over which the road from the pier passes. Upon it, in the rear of the property of Mr. Du Berger? is a little stream which disappears under ground, probably in a fissure of the underlying limestone, and returns to the surface only on the shore of the bay. Above this is a smaller and less distinct terrace 139 feet high. Beyond this the ground rises in a steep slope, which in many places consists of calcareous beds, worn and abraded by the waves, but showing no distinct terrace ; and the highest distinct shore mark which I observed, is a narrow beach of rounded pebbles at the heifiht of more than 300 feet ; but above this there is a flat at the heioht of 448 feet. This beach appears to become a wide terrace further to the North, and also on the opposite side of the bay. It probably corresponds with the highest terrace observed by Sir W. E. Logan, at Bay St. Paul, and estimated by him at the height of 360 feet. As already stated, three of the principal terraces at Murray Bay correspond nearly with three of the principal shore levels at Montreal ; and in various parts of Canada, two principal lines of old sea beaches occur at about 100 to 150 feet, and 300 to 350 feet above the sea, though there are others at different levels. In the Post-pliocene period the valley of the Murray Bay river has been filled, almost or quite to the level of the highest terrace, witli an enormously thick mass of mud and boulders, washed from the land and deposited in the sea bed during the long period of Post-pliocene submergence. Through this mass the deep val- ley of the river has been cut, and the clay, deprived of support and resting on inclined surfaces, has slipped downward, forming strangely shaped slopes, and outlying masses, that have in some instances been moulded by the receding waves, or by the subse- quent action of the weather, into conical mounds, so regular that it is difficult to convince many of the visitors to the bay that they are not artificial. Sir W. E. Logan in his report on the district has in my view given the true explanation of these mounds, which 186 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. may be seen in all stages of formation on the neighbouring hill sides. Their effect to a geological eye is to give to this beautiful valley an unfinished aspect, as if the time elapsed since its eleva- tion had not been sufficient to allow its slopes to attain to their fully rounded contour. This appearance is no doubt due to the enormous thickness of the deposit of Post-pliocene mud, to the uneven surfaces of the underlying rock, and possibly also in part to the earthquake shocks which have visited this region. At the mouth of the Murray Bay River, the Boulder-clay, which rests directly on the striated rock surfj;ices, and which is a true till, filled with the Laurentian stones and boulders of the inland hills, though resting on Silurian limestone, is evidently marine, since it contains shells of Lecla truncata ; and many of the stones are coated with Bryozoa and Spirorhes. It is also ob- servable that on the N.E. sides of the limestone ridges the boul- ders are more numerous and larger. Above the Boulder-clay may in some places be seen a stratified sandy clay, which further up the river attains to a great thickness. It contains Saxicava rugosa, TeUina Grcenlandica, and Tellina calcarea, as well as Leda truncata. The most recent deposit is a sand or gravel, often of con- siderable thickness, and in some of the beds of gravel the pebbles are more completely rounded than those of the modern beach. I have already, in Section I, stated my reasons for believing that the upper part of the valley of the Murray Bay River may have been the bed of a glacier flowing down from the inland hills toward the St. Lawrence. N.W. and S.E. ktrige attributable to this glacier were seen at an elevation of 800 feet, and the marine beds were traced up to almost the same height, above which, to a heidit of about 1200 feet, loose boulders were observed and glaciated rock surfaces, but no marine deposits. It is probable, therefore, that at a time when the sea extended up to an elevation of 800 feet, the higher part of the valley may have been filled with land ice. Whether the bergs from this, drifting down to- ward the St. Lawrence, produced the N.W. striation observed at a lower level, or whether at a previous period, when the land was higher, the ice extended farther down, may admit of doubt. Certainly no land ice has extended to a lower level than about 800 feet, since the deposition of the marine boulder and Leda clay. Very large boulders occur in this vicinity. One observed on the beach on the east side of the Bay, is an oval mass of lime felspar, thirty feet in circumference, lying like most other large boulders in this region, with its longer axis to the N.E. No. 1.] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 18T Les Eboulements. — At this place the Laurentiaii hills rise to a great height near the shore, and the Post- pliocene beds present the exceptional feature of resting on soft decomposed Silurian shale (Utica shale). This rock might indeed be mistaken for drift, but for its stratification, and it must have been decomposed to a great depth by subaerial action and subsequently submerged and covered by the Post-pliocene beds. Its preservation is the more remarkable that the clay overlying it contains very large Laurentian boulders, which must have been quietly deposited by floating ice. Only a few shells of TelJlna Gnenlandica were observed in these clays. The remarkable series of terraces seen at this place, and noticed in part first, rising to 900 feet in height, are all cut out of the Post-pliocene beds and decomposed shale, and even the highest presents large boulders. In examining such terraces it is always necessary to distinguish between the clays out of which the ter- races have been cut and the more modern deposits resting on the terraces. Both may contain fossils, but those of the original clay are in this region mostly of deeper water species than those in the overlying superficial beds. I attribute the preservation of the thick beds of Boulder-clay and the decomposed shale at Les Eboulements, to the fact that no transverse valley exists here, and that a point of high Lauren- tian land projects to the North-East, so as to shelter this place from forces acting in that direction. I have observed this appear- ance on the lee or South-west side of other projecting masses of hard rock, and as the decomposed shale must be a monument remaining from the Pliocene elevation of the land, it shews that no powerful eroding force had acted between that time and the period of the N. E. arctic ice-laden currents. It is perhaps deserving of notice that the thick beds of soft material at Les Eboulements have been cut into many irregular forms by modern subaerial causes of denudation, and also by landslips, which last have been in part connected with the earth- quake shocks with which this part of the coast has been visited more than any other district of Canada. Above Les Eboulements, Bay St. Paul presents features simi- lar to those of Murray Bay, and then the Laurentian land of Cape Tourment comes boldly forward to the shore of the River. Above this the conditions are similar to those observed in the neighbourhood of Quebec. (^To be continued.) 188 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. ON THE " COLONIES " OF M. BAREANDE. By Henry Alleyne Nicholson, M.D., D.Sc, M.A., Ph.D., F.R.S E., F.G.S., &c. Professor of Natural History and Botany in Univer- sity College, Toronto. The doctrine of " Colonies," propounded by M. Barrande, has been long before the palgeontological world, and is known, at any rate by name, to all students of geology. It is doubtful, however, if there is as clear a comprehension of this subject as its import- ance would render desirable ; and it may, therefore, be of inte- rest to discuss briefly the leading facts upon which this theory is based. In so doing, I shall take the necessary details from M. Barrande's " Defense des Colonies," published in 1870, one of the most valuable of the many palgeontological works of this dis- tinguished observer, and I shall confine myself chiefly to a rtsumi of the facts therein recorded and the deductions drawn therefrom. I. Sub-divisions of the Silurian Rocks of Bohemia. The Silurian Rocks of Bohemia are described by M. Barrande as occupying an elliptical basin, the long axis of which has a N.E., and S.W. direction, and a length of 148 kilometres. The breadth of the basin increases gradually in passing from the N.E. to the S.W., its minimum breadth being about 30 kilometres, and its maximum about 74 kilometres. The Silurians of this basin repose upon granitic and gneissic rocks, and dip inwards towards a central line. The fossiliferous beds of the entire basin occupy a far from considerable superficial area ; and their extent — supposing them not to have been much denuded — would assign to the Silurian sea of Bohemia an area not exceeding 1-60 of the superficies of the Adriatic. The Silurian rocks of the entire basin admit of separation into two primary divisions, an Inferior and a Siqjerior division, cor- responding respectively to the Lower and Upper Silurian Rocks of Sir Roderick Murchison. The Inferior Division is composed principally of schists and quartzites ; or, as we should say, slates and grits or graywackes, and is wholly destitute of calcareous No. 2.] THE "colonies" of m. barrande. 189 matter, except occasional concretions of carbonate of lime. The Superior Division is composed almost entirely of calcareous mat- ter, with merely subordinate bands of schists and quartzites. Each division can be satisfactorily broken up into four sub-divi- sions (etages), grounded solely upon the characters of their con- tained fossils, and lettered in ascending order : — The dtages of the Inferior Division are A., B., C, D. The dtages of the Superior Division are E., F., G., H. Each of the fossiliferous sub-divisions can be further broken up into minor groups or " bands," distinguished by the smaller letters of the alphabet, as shown in the annexed table. Etages A. & B., the lowest of the Inferior Division^ are com- posed of semi-crystalline rocks and conglomerates, and are unfos- siliferous. They are termed by Barrande the "Azoic Etages," and are considered by him as forming the base of the Silurian Series. It is, however, more probable that they should be re- garded as being truly of Lower Cambrian age, Etages C. D. E. F. G. & H. are fossiliferous. Etage C. is the well-known " Primordial Zone " of Bohemia, corresponding with the Menevian beds of Britain, and characterized by primordial trilobites of the genera Faradoxides, Olenus, Conocori/phe, Ellip- tocephalus, &c. It should probably be regarded as Upper Cam- brian. Etage D. contains Barrande's so-called " faune second " or second fauna, and must correspond with the Llandeilo and Cara- doc beds of Britain. Etages E. F. G. & H. are characterized by a single fauna termed by Barrande the " faune troisieme " or third fauna ; and they correspond collectively to the Upper Silurian Rocks of Britain. The precursors (" avanteureurs ") of this "third fauna" in the last portions of the period of the " second fauna " are termed by Barrande the " colonies." They are in the form of bands which are enclosed in the mass of (^tage D towards its higher part, and which are thus stratigraphicallij Lower Silurian, but which, nevertheless, contain a predominance of fossils characteristic of the "third fauna," and thus comQ palceontologically to belong to the Upper Silurian series. They abound especially in the band d 5, occurring also in d 4, and about twenty of them are known in all. The subjoined table shows in a summary form the general subdivisions and lithology of the rocks of the Bohemian basin, with the principal characteristic fossils: — 190 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. P5".,— IC^JCO •* lO r— l(Mi— iClr-lClCOr-^C^lCO "^ "^ i» iu ^^ '^. ^ c; fe ■< -ii; 1^ ope 6c fc€ O, ^ ^v ,, ^: =3 "^'S]^ ' ' ' • ^" .S o-;;^ ® © ® ® s-< ^St:! bo Ui ^ ^ = WhE pq h W W O £1 O OQ No. 2.] THE "colonies" of m. barrande. 191 II. Distribution of the Colonies. The colonial zone occupies a great part of the superficial area and vertical thickness of the band d 5, forming an elliptical zone or belt concentric with the calcareous rocks of the Upper Silurian basin. From this basin the colonial zone is generally separated by schists and quartzites, which form the summit of d 5, and which contain no fossils of an animal nature. On the surface of this zone the colonies are distributed in concentric but discon- tinuous lines, with irregular intervals between. Each colony is in the form of a lenticular mass, of which the length enormously exceeds the breadth and thickness ; and the phenomena of their distribution and their relations to the surrounding rocks prove plainly that they cannot be explained by invoking the agency of mechanical disturbance or faults. Several interbedded traps are found in the colonial zone, regu- larly interstratified with the colonies, and similar beds are found in band e 1 at the base of Etage E. They all have the form of elongated lenticular masses thinning out at both extremities. As the Silurian rocks of Bohemia form a basin, the colonies are, as a matter of course, found on both sides of the central group of calcareous rocks (Upper Silurian). With the exception of the " Colony Zippe," which is found in cZ 4, all the colonies are found in the lower portion of c? 5 ; and, like the rocks amongst which they are situated, they dip inwards towards the axis of the basin. III. — LiTHOLOGY OF THE COLONIES COMPARED WITH THAT OF BANDS e 1, e 2, c? 4, & 6? 5 : A. Band, e 2. — This band is the second subdivision of Etage E., and is composed mainly of continuous beds of limestone, often fetid, almost black in colour, and chiefly composed of the debris of Crinoids. The beds of limestone are separated by thin courses of impure shales containing a few graptolites. Lithologically e 2 difi'ers most markedly botli from band e 1 and from the colonies ; but nevertheless the palaeontological relationships of the colonial zone are far stron";er with e 2 than with e 1, though the mineral characters of e 1 are identical with those of the colonies. B. Band e 1 : — Band e 1 constitutes the stratigraphical base of Etage E. or of the Upper Silurian Series of Bohemia. It consists wholly of Graptolitic Schists, enclosing calcareous spher- 192 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. oids or " antbracolites" and having intercalated beds of trap. Its thickness is very variable, sometimes exceeding 600 metres, and it is always much thicker than band e 2. Lithologically, therefore, as well as in possessing interbedded traps, e 1 differs greatly from e 2. In the same way, the palaeon- tological differences between the two are sufficiently well marked, though they are united by many specific connexions. Each, how- ever, has its own fauna, and the richness of the two is very unequal. Thus, e 1 possesses but 15 Trilobites, whilst e 2 has 81 species ; e 1 has yielded no more than 149 Cephalopods, whilst e 2 has yielded the extraordinary number of 665 species ; and sim- ilar differences are found in the Gasteropods, Bivalves, and Brachiopods. Still, the propriety of retaining e 1 and e 2 on the same stratigraphical horizon is shown by numerous palgeontologi- cal relationships, amongst which may be mentioned the fact that 68 Cephalopods are common to the two divisions. C. Band d 5 : — Band d 5 underlies band e 1, and forms the summit of Etaii'e D., or the hio;hest division of the Lower Silurian Series of Bohemia. Its upper portion has a thickness of 100 metres and is composed of alternating thin beds of gray schist and quartzite (graywacke). It is remarkable in being wholly desti- tute of fossils of an animal nature, having yielded nothing more than a few ^'Fucoids". This thick deposit, therefore, corresponds with a prolonged and total intermission of the Silurian fauna of the Bohemia area. The thickness of this unfossiliferous formation might serve as an approximate measure of the time which elapsed between the last appearance of the colonial fauna and the definitive appear- ance of the "third fjiuna" (Upper Silurian fauna). In certain localities, however, this unfossiliferous mass appears to have un- dergone partial denudation^ prior to the dcp>osition of e\. It may be remarked here that the above observation ofM. Barrande would seem to indicate a want of conformity between Etage D. and Etage E., such as is found in many other countries between the Lower and Upper Silurian rocks. If this be so, the interval between the colonial fauna and the introduction of the third fauna may have been indefinitely Ion 5, and cannot even be approximately measured by the thickness of the upper part of db. Below this unfossiliferous series, band c? 5 is composed of masses of argillaceous schist of different tints, sometimes with subordi- No. 2.] THE •• COLONIES ■' OF M. BARRANDE. 193 nate beds of quartzite. Id all cases, witli the exception of the colony Zippe, the colonies are intercalated in this portion of fZ 5 ; and there are also numerous beds (" coulees '') of trap at various horizons. As will be seen immediately, this portion of d 5 is chiefly distinguished from the beds of the colonies by the fact that the schists are almost wholly destitute of graptolites. D. The Colonies. — The colonies, as just remarked, are situated in the schistose lower portion of d 5, and they are lithologically absolutely undistinguishable from band e 1, consisting of grapto- litic schists with calcareous concretions and interbedded traps. The following distinctions, however, may be noted as compared with el: — 1. The thickness of the colonies is always much less than that of band e 1 ; and there are fewer alternations of the graptolitic schists with the traps. 2. Certain colonies are composed entirely of schists without traps. 3. In some colonies (e. g. Colony Haidinger and Colony Cotta) there are bands of gray schists and quartzites like those of d 5. 4. The calcareous concretions are generally rarer in the colonies than in the band e 1, and they even appear to be wanting in some colonies, especially in the deepest {e. g. m the Colony Haidinger.) E. Bund fZ, 4: — This band is composed of impure schists, which are always highly micaceous and deeply coloured, brown, gray or black. Though fissile, they are niuch less homogeneous and papery ('' feuilletes ") than those which constitute the supe- rior band d 5. Sometimes there are intercalated beds of quartz- ite, and occasionally there are interbedded sheets of trap. There is only one colony in d 4, namely the Colony Zippe, situated with- in the ramparts of Prague. This colony differs from all the rest by its being entirely composed of a lenticular mass of limestone, about 25 centimetres thick, intercalated in the midst of regular alternations of schist and quartzite. IV. Pal^ontological Relations of the Colonies. From what has preceded, it is evident that stratigraphically the colonies belong to the Lower Silurian series, and we have now to enquire what relationships can be shown to subsist between the colonial fauna and the second and third fauna respectively. The specific connexions of the colonial fauna, when examined in de- VoL. VI. K No. 2. 194 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. tail, will then be found to be most close and intimate with the first phases of the third fauna (Upper Silurian), so that palaeon- tologically the colonies must be regarded as truly Upper Silurian. This result will be brought out by a comparison of the fauna of the colonies with that of the Lower and Upper Silurian periods respectively : — A. Specific connexions hetwee/i the Colonies and the Second Fauna. — As yet only two colonies are known in which there is any intermixture of the characteristic forms of the second fauna (Lower Silurian) with those of the colonial fauna, i.e. with those of the third fauna (Upper Silurian). Thus, out of seventeen species in the colony Zippe, there are four species representing the second fauna, with twelve species belonging to the third fauna. On the other hand, in the colony d'Archiac there are only two species of the third fauna (viz. Cardiola interrupta and Grapto- lites p)Tiodon f). It is quite clear, therefore, that the colonial fauna, as a whole, has very slight connexion with the second or Lower Silurian fauna. B. Specific connexions between the Colonies and the Third Fauna. — In showing the specific connexions between the colonies and the third or Upper Silurian fauna, it will be advisable to review briefly the difierent orders of fossils represented in the Silurian basin of Bohemia. a. Fishes. — No traces of fishes have been detected in the colo- nies or in the whole of the Lower Silurian series, and their only indubitable remains occur in Etages F and G, which have hardly any connexion with the colonies. (Altogether five fishes have been discovered in the Upper Silurians of Bohemia, viz. Coccos- teus primus, C. Agassizi, Asterolepis Bohemicus, Gompholepis Panderi, and Ctenacanthus Bohemicus.^ h. Crustaceans. — These are principally trilobites. The trilo- bites of the colonies, not taking into account the four species of the second fauna, are referable to eight species and seven genera, all belonging to the third fauna. The trilobites are, therefore, very limited in number, and their paucity agrees perfectly with the small number of these crustaceans in the first phase of the third fauna, i. c. in e 1, in which only fifteen species are known. On the other hand d 5 and d 4 have together furnished about eighty trilobites peculiar to the last phases of the second fauna. The remaining Crustaceans of the colonial fauna are Pterygotus Bohemicus^ Ceratiocaris incequalisj Entomis migrans, and Apty- No. 2.] THE "colonies" of m. barrande. 195 chopsis (^Peltocarls) primus, all of which reappear in the third fauna. Ceratiocaris, however, occurs in d 5. Aptychopsis (or FeJtocaris, Salter, as it more probably is) occurs in the Scotch Upper Llandeilos, whereas in Bohemia it is confined to the base of the Upper Silurians (e 1 and e 2) and to the colonies, A similar, if not identical form, however, has recently been disco- vered by Mr. Lap worth in the Scotch Silurians, high up in the series, and I have found another closely similar form in the sand- stone of the Coniston series (Caradoc) of the north of England. c. Cephalopoda. — This class of fossils, as is well known, has been an object of M. Barraude's especial study, and his results are, therefore, of the highest value and interest. The Cephalo- poda are represented in the colonial fauna by thirty-six species, of which all except species of Cyrtocera are referable to the genus Orthoceras. The Cephalopods, therefore, abounded in the colo- nial fauna, and this ai»;ain ao;rees with the state of thini>s in the earlier portion of the third fauna. On the other hand, bands df) and d 4, though much thicker than the colonies, have only yielded altogether eighteen species of Cephalopoda, the paucity of these fossils thus contrasting strongly with the abundance of trilobites. It should also be remarked that the small representation of the genus Cyrtoceras in the colonies (only two species being known) contrasts very strongly with the total absence of the genus in the second fauna, and its great abundance in the earlier phases of the third fauna, twenty -six species occurring in e 1, and no less than 201 species in e 2. Lastly, of the thirty-six species of Cephalo- poda in the colonies, not one is specifically identical with any form known in the second fauna. On the contrary, thirty -one species reappear on difi"ereut horizons in the third fauna, the remaining five species being peculiar to the colonies. d. Pteropoda. — Only two species of Hyolithes occur in the colonies, and both reappear in the first phase of the third fauna. Neither occur in ;rations must have jiiven rise to colonies, which are placed on the same horizon, and consist of graptolitic schists, almost always accompanied by flows of trap, and often containing; calcareous concretions. In consequence of inauspicious conditions, and from the cessa- tion of these schistose and calcareous deposits, all the colonies must have enjoyed a relatively short existence during the period that the Bohemian area was occupied by the second fauna. The appearance of the colonies coinciding constantly with the graptolitic deposits, we are compelled to attribute both equally to the influence of currents arising in the same quarter. The introduction of intermittent currents into the isolated basin of Bohemia seems to have been caused by oscillations of the land, connected with the production of the traps which occur so frequently in bands d 5 and e 1. In all cases, the colonial species appeared on difibrent horizons without being able to establish themselves permanently in Bohe- mia during the last phase of the second fauna. After the complete extinction of the second fauna, however, and after a prolonged intermission, during which the Bohemian basin appears to have been deserted, a new immigration, arising from the same foreign centre, must have invaded the Bohemian sea, and must have succeeded in permanently establishing itself there. (I may remark here that few palaeontologists would admit that the presence of a considerable mass of unfossiliferous beds in the midst of a fossiliferous series, necessarily implies a period in which life did not exist, as above assumed by M. Barrande. More probably the local conditions were such as to cause a local migration of the existent fauna, or such as not to allow of their preservation in a fossil condition. There certainly do not seem to be sufficient grounds for the assumption that the whole of the second fauna of Bohemia died out during the deposition of the upper part of d 5, and the absence of fossils might be partially accounted for by the lithological nature of the deposits in ques- 2(12 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. tion. which are stated by Barrande to consist chiefly of gray- wackes and grits (" qiiartzites "). Lastly, there are indications that e 1 is superimposed nnconformably upon d 6, in which case the intervitl between the second and third faunas may have been an enormously long one, and some intermediate deposits may be missing.) The above definitive introduction, constituting the first phase of the third or Upper Silurian fauna, must have taken place during the deposition of the band e 1, the basement band of the superior division, which agrees lithologically wdth the colonies in being composed of graptolitic schists with calcareous concretions, alternating with sheets of trap. It is clear that the interpretation of the facts rests chiefly on the hypothesis of migrations. Most geologists now admit the doctrine of migrations, and Bohemia more than any country pre- sents us with proofs of its truth. Thus, M. Barrande has shown that the Bohemian basin of Silurian times was separated by natural barriers from the con- temporaneous ocean which covered the great northern zone of Europe and America. This is shewn by the specific differences between many of the forms (such as the Ceplialo2Joda] of these areas ; but the occurrence of some species common to Bohemia and Northern Europe has also shown that there must have existed temporary communications between these diff'erent regions. Fur- ther, M. Barrande has shown [Mem. sur hi Reapparition dit genre Aretliusinii, 1868,1 that although the colonies are the most striking examples of the intermittent appearance of species in Bohemia, there exists besides in the same b i«iii a considerable number of species equally intermittent, and belonging to difi"erent classes of fossils. This was particularly shown by the occurrence of four Trilobites and one Cephalopod, which existed in c/ 1, at the commencement of the second fauna, completely disappeared during d 2, d 3, and d 4, a.nd reappeared in d 5 at the close of the second fauna, their re ippearance coinciding precisely with the introduc- tion of the colonies into the basin. Both these circumstances can be explained by the same hypo- thesis, namely by supposing a temporary communication to be formed between the Bohemian basin and other seas. This hypo- thesis would not only explain the reappearance of the above-men- tioned species after the lapse of a vast period of time, but would also allow of the almost inevitable introduction of various other new forms into the same basin at the same time. No. 2.] THE WHALE OF THE ST. LAWRENCE. 203 We have, then, oi> tlie one liand, the fact tliat the Silurian basin of Bohemia was isohited and separated from other reuions, over which successively existed the three general faunas chnrac- teristic of the Silurian period (with the Upj)er Cambrian i. On the other hand, divers well established facts demonstrate the co- existence of a certain number of identical species on corresponding horizons in countries geographically widely removed from one another. This co-existence can only be explained by the effect of miiirations. We may suppose, therefore, that the repeated introduction into Bohemia of species which are equally characteristic of the colo nies and of the third fauna, may be explained by having recourse to the phenomenon of migrations. We may ;dso suppose that the intermittent appearance of the colonies may be attributed to oscillations of the land during the last phases of the second fauna, the occurrence of such oscillations being testified by the frequent intercalation of traps in the beds in question (viz. in d b). Lastly, we may define the phenomena of "" colonies ' as con- sisting in '' the co existence of two ijeneral fauna), which, con- sidered in their entirety, are nevertheless successive." THE WHALP] OF THE ST. LAWRENCE. 1!\- Di!. .1. W. Am)KI!S()n, I'rcsidciit of the I^itoiarN' and Historical Society ol' QucIk-c. In the early history of Canada, the whale and walrus fishery of the Gulf of St, Lawrence was of no inconsiderable influence, giving employment to many of the Basque and Breton fishermen, and being one of the best nurseries for French seamen In later times when the walrus had become entirely extinct, the whale fishery was prosecuted with energy by the Canadians, especially of the District of 0 is})e ; and Bouchette, writing in 1882, says: " The whale fishery is carried on witli some success by a few active and enterprising inhabitants, who are almost exclusively employed in this kind of fishery. Four or five schooners, manned each with from eight to twelve able and skilful persons, are occu- pied in whaling during the summer months. This business yields about 18.00(1 gallons of oil. which is principally sent to Quebec. 204 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. VI. The number of hands employed in reducing the blubber to oil, preparing casks, and other incidental labour, may amount to about 100." Mr. Frank Austin, a few years ago, read a paper to the Lite- rary and Historical Society of Quebec, on " Some of the Fishes of the St. Lawrence." In this paper, published in the "Tran- sactions" for 1866, it is stated that it gave profitable employ- ment to a good many schooners of from seventy to eighty tons burthen, each manned by eight men. Each schooner carried two boats, twenty feet long, narrow and sharp, with a pink stern. There were two hundred and twenty fathoms of line to each boat, and the proper supply of harpoons and lances. The .species caught was that commonly called the Humi^hach^ and each on an average produced three tons of oil. The mode of capture was somewhat different from that practised by the w^halers who resort to Davis' Straits and Greenland, and it is said that any active man, accus- tomed to the management of boats, could soon become proficient. When approaching the whale in the boats, the men used paddles instead of oars, finding that less noise was made, and that they were thus surer of their prey. It would appear that the whale of the St. Lawrence was even more easily captured than that of Greenland, being if anything more timid and stupid w^hen once harpooned, for sometimes within fifteen minutes after they had been struck, their huge bodies rolled like helpless logs on the water. The oil-yielded in 1864 by the Gaspe fishery was of the value of $17,000. We have no means at hand to say what the returns have been since then, but we have reason to fear that like the porpoise fishery, the capture of the whale has not received that attention which it deserved, nnd that unless new life be im- parted, it will altogether cease to be prosecuted as a regular and remunerative branch of national industry. The valuable walrus fishery was lost by ignorance, which led to the complete extinc- tion of the animal in the St. Lawrence. The whale fishery stands a chance of abandonment from apathy. We were struck on reading Sir Richard Bonnycastle's book, published in 1845, by remarkiog the number of whales which he saw on his voyage up and down the St. Lawrence, between Gaspe and Kamouraska. Certainly they do not now frequent the St. Lawrence in such abundance. In the Canadian 3Iagazlnc, vol. 1, page 283, will be found as follows : — " About the middle of September (1823) a large whale No. 2.] THE WHALE OF THE ST. LAWRENCE. 205 found its way up the St. Lawrence till nearly opposite the village of Montreal, where it continued to play itself for several days^ not being able, from the shallowness of the water, to navigate its way down the river. Having attracted the notice of" the inhabi- tants, several enterprising individuals put off in boats with some whale-fishing materials in pursuit of it ; and at last after nearly a week's exertion it was harpooned by Captain Brush of the Tow steamboat. It was immediately dragged ashore, and exhibited in a booth fitted up lor the purpose, for the gratification of the in- habitants. It was found to measure forty-two feet eight inches in length, six feet across the back, and seven feet deep. It has since been conveyed to Three Rivers and Quebec for the same purpose." Early in August of this year (1871) two whales were seen sporting on the shores of the Gulf, and a Mr. Chabot. and an Englishman, who claim to have invented a gun harpoon (on Capt.. Manby's principle), brought their gun to the shore and discharged the harpoon. As the whale instantly disappeared, and as the rope returned to the shore without the harpoon, they were under the impression that the whale had been struck. Some days after- wards, the government steamer ' Druid ' being down the North Channel, saw something on the beach at St. Joachim, which they thought at first was a boat, but on nearer approach it was dis- covered to be a whale. Ropes were attached to the jaw and tail^ and the huge animal was towed to the Police Wharf at Quebec, where for a few days it was visited by thousands, but becoming extremely offensive, and the weather being very hot, the Mayor very properly ordered it to be removed. It was sold by auction, and purchased by Mr. Gregor}' for $2G0, and was then towed to ' Patrick's Hole,' close to tlie Church of St. Laurent, where Wolfe's army first landed, and there beached and preparations made for fiecliing it. I had not an o])portunity of seeing it at Quebec, but through the politeness of Mr. Gregory, who gave me a passage, I had the satisfaction of seeing it at ' Patrick's Hole.' On approaching the beach we saw a number of the inhabitants around it, and on our nearer approach, our nostrils informed us that it was not the Guard's bouquet which made- all the women have their handker- chiefs at their noses ! I was not prepared to find so huge an animal. It was supposed that the two whales had been a female and its calf, and I was in- 206 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. formed that it was the calf that had been found. It turned out to be an aged male, apparently of the species Balcena Mysticetus. I measured it as carefully as I could, and satisfied myself that it was sixty-Jive feet in length. The back was black, the belly fur- rowed, presenting exactly the appearance of a clinker-built boat, and each furrow alternately black and dingy white. The baleeas of one side had been lost by being caught on the rocks while it was being hauled ashore, but the other though it had been re- moved from the jaw, was quite perfect, till the visitors began to appropriate its plates. With the permission of Mr. Gregory I secured a few plates. I never had an opportunity of seeing so large a whale before, though I saw the skeleton of the whale stranded on the beach of Portobello, near Edinburgh, in 1829, and purchased by Dr. Knox. I concluded after a careful exami- nation that it answered fully the description given by De Kay, as follows : Nat. Ord. Cetacea ; Genus Balcena ; Species, Balcena mysti- cetus. Right or common whale. Characteristics, black, occasion- ally varied with white or yellow. Gape of the mouth, arched, with about 600 laminae of whalebone. Length, forty to sixty feet. Description : body thickest in the middle, a little behind the fore paws; somewhat furrowed, tapering towards the tail. Head large, somewhat triangular. Opening of the mouth large, with a few scattering hairs on the end of the jaws. Eyes very small, and placed near the corners of the mouth. External jaw ex- ceedingly minute. Spiracles two, oblong, adjacent, slightly largish in front. Palate and sides of upper jaw with two rows of whale- bone from ten to thirteen feet long, and generally curved longi- tudinally^ and giving an arched form to the roof of the mouth. Each series consists of three hundred or more laminae of whale- bone, the interior edges of which are covered with a hair-like fringe. Swimming paws rounded, somewhat pointed, 7 — 9 feet Ions: with a width of 4 — 5 feet, and situated about two feet be- hind the angle of the mouth. Tail very broad, notched in the centre, curved on the edges, and pointed at the tips. Colour : blackish throughout, occasionally with a small space under the body, and a larger space on the lower jaw, whitish grey or flesh colour. Very old individuals become varied with white, black, or piebald. Weight from 60 to 100 tons. It is presumed to have a gestation of nine months, produces one at a birth, which it suckles for about a year. It exhibits great maternal fondness, No. 2.] THE WHALE OF THE ST. LAWRENCE. 20T and although at other times remarkably timid, manifests great boldness and even ferocity in defending its young. It is gregari- ous, and was formerly found in every part of the ocean, but has been driven by the fishermen from the coasts of Europe and America. It was early followed by the Americans to the South Pacific, and its capture is now prosecuted in India and Africa. From the structure of its jaws and the smallness of its throat, it can only feed on the smaller oceanic animals, such as medusae or sea jellies, shrimps, crabs, and some minute mollusca. Hence it differs most materially from the genus cacheJot or sperm whale, which has got a wide gullet, and is capable of swallowing fishes of very considerable size. It feeds abundantly on the mackerel, and a portion of a shark has even been found in its stomach. At first thought it appears very wonderful that so immense an animal as the common whale should have to depend for its subsistence on minute animals, but the wonder ceases when we examine the waters to which they resort, sometimes in very large herds. De Kay says that he has seen off the coast of Brazil hundreds of miles where the mollusca are so numerous as to discolour the water, giving the appearance of wheat scattered over a reddish sandbank ; and Scoresby has estimated that in some parts of the Arctic seas twenty-three quadrillions of such animalculae are dis- tributed over a surface of two square miles. There is very great difierence in the accounts given of the size of the two whales which I have mentioned. Some writers give the length of the sperm wliale at from 70 to 80 feet, and of the common whale at from 80 to 100 feet. It is quite possible that such may have been occasionally found, but they are to be viewed as exceptional, for Capt. Scoresby, the very highest authority, and who had per- son:illy engaged in the capture of 322 whales, says that not one of them exceeded 60 feet. I may mention how apt people are to be deceived as to the size of objects, and that no reliance can be placed on anything but actual measurement. A gentleman of Quebec, noted for his general intelligence and the interest he takes in all these subjects, met me in the library of the Literary and Historical Societ}^, on his return from Cacouna. He said: " So you have had a great visitor at Quebec during my absence, but not so great as one that visited the St. Lawrence nearly fifty years ago, and was captured at Montreal. I have seen that the whale brought here last week was onli/ 65 feet long ; I should say that the other was at least a 208 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST, [Vol. VI. third larger." He was both surprised and amused when I read to him the account from the Canadian Magazine which I have already given. The obvious difference between the sperm whale and the common is, tliat the sperm has a dorsal fin, and when the water is smooth the projection or hump is seen two or three feet above the surface. Its throat is also large, so that it would have no difficulty in swallowing a man. The Mysticetus or common whale, on the other hand, has neither dorsal fin or hnmp, and its gullet, as has been already said, is exceedingly small, not more than 1^ inches in diameter. . According to my admeasurement, corroborated by Mr. Gregory, as the whale lay on the beach at ' Patrick's Hole,' he was sixty- five feet long, the fluke of his tail twelve feet, his jaw fifteen feet. From the condition he was in, I could not measure his breadth. When the skeleton was subsequently brought to the Police Wharf I had an opportunity of verifying, at any rate to my own satis- faction, the correctness of my first measure. The jaw bone, as it lay on the wharf stripped of all covering, measured exactly fourteen feet six inches. I felt justified from this fact in con- sidering that my other measurements had been equally correct. Taking his length, then, at sixty-five feet, he was twenty-three feet lono-er than the one killed at Montreal in 1823, and five feet larger than the extreme length given by De Kay to the Mystice- tus. A whale of such a size under ordinary circumstances should have yielded about sixty barrels of oil ; this one only gave six, which is endeavoured to be accounted for by the supposition that he was aged, diseased, and worn out. May it not have been possible that having strayed from his feeding grounds, and having wandered up the St. Lawrence, where I believe he would have to depend for his subsistence on shrimps and medusae alone, he may have died from simple inanition. At any rate there was no mark of violence on his body, and Mr. Chabot's brother, who was sent to claim the whale as killed by his harpoon, failed to trace any wound or to find the harpoon, as he had expected. The skeleton has been well cleaned, and is very nearly complete, though the thin bones of the skull have been considerably fractured. It is still in the possession of Mr. Gregory, who has been more desir- ous of promoting science than enriching himself by the preserva- tion of this splendid skeleton. We trust that some of our scien- tific bodies may make an efibrt to secure it, so that it may not be permitted to be sent out of the Province. No. 2.] THE PRIMORDIAL ROCKS OF TROY. 209 NOTES ON THE PRIMORDIAL ROCKS IN THE VICINITY OF TROY, N. Y. By S. W. Ford. (^From the American Journal of Science and Arts, Vol. II., July, 1871.) In view of the prevailing uncertainty respecting- the age of the rocks of that portion of the Taconic series of Profes-sor Emmons lying east of the Hudson river, I was led several years ago to undertake the investigation of some of these rocks in my own neighbourhood, though I had but few hopes of learning anything essentially new about them. It soon became apparent that much valuable information might be obtained from them ; and from certain facts which early came under my observation I was induced to continue their study. I propose here to notice briefly some of the more noteworthy results thus far obtained. The rocks immediately east of the Hudson at Troy are fine, black, glazed shales, with occasional sandy layers, and have usually been regarded as belonging to the Hudson River formation. They have been greatly crushed, but their general dip is evidently eastward, and at a high angle. They extend eastward about half a mile, and form a hill of considerable maanitude within the city limits. Following the course of this hill northward, we find them frequently well exposed in railway cuttings, and before reaching Lansingburgh, which is three miles distant, in a bold elevation several hundred feet in heiiiht. The only fossils which these shales have afforded, are the ob- scure form described under the name of DiscojyJii/Uum peltutum (Pal. N. Y., vol. i, 277, plate Ixxv, fig. 3), and two or three species of graptolites, the latter having been but recently obtained. The graptolites resemble closely certain well-known Hudson river forms, but whether certainly identical I am at present unable to state. If truly Hudson river shales, then the absence of any other fos- sils in these rocks, except those above mentioned, appears not a little remarkable. Upon the east, after an interval of concealment varying some- what in different localities, these shales are followed by the widely different rocks of the " Taconic " series, likewise dipping Vol. VI. P No. 2. 210 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. eastward, and apparently at about the same angle. The best ex- posures of these rocks in this vicinity occur opposite the central portion of the city, where they are brought to view in a number of abrupt, quickly concealed ridges. These ridges trend northerly and southerly, and appear to be all constructed upon the same pattern, having on the west a steep, on the east a more gradual slope. Only the western faces are naturally exposed. This uniformity of structure is very striking, and there are reasons for believing that it has resulted largely from successive short, sharp folds in the strata, of which we have a fine example in the rocks east of Lansingburgh ; but as nearly the whole district is covered with a thick sheet of drift, and the rocks bear evidence of exten- sive faulting, much further study will be necessary before it will be fully understood. These ridges generally consist for the most part of coarse red and yellow weathering slates and shales, with occasional thin-bed- ded sandstones ; but the most of them are supposed, and four of them are known, to hold subordinate limestone deposits. Of these deposits the two westernmost individually consist of a few courses of thick-bedded limestone, and of irregular, sometimes lenticular, sp:irry and frequently pebbly masses, varying from one to several hundred pounds in weight, imbedded in a coarse, dirty-looking arenaceous matrix : while the others form tolerably compact, even-bedded limestones, with an abundance of scattered black nodules, from twenty-five to thirty feet in thickness. So fir as investigated, these limestones have been found to be highly fossiliferous, though the fossils are usually in a very fragmentary condition. From two of them — one of the conglomer- ates and one of the even-bedded masses — the writer has made frequent collections during the last three years. With a single exception the same species occur in both. Up to the present time they have yielded eighteen species, which are distributed as follows : Protozoa (^AnJiencijathus) 1 species. Brachiopoda 7 " Lamellibranchiata 1 " Gasteropoda 1 Pteropoda [Jli/olifhes) 2 Annelida {Salterelht) 1 it a Crustacea 5 (t Total, 18 No. 2.] THE PRIMORDIAL ROCKS OF TROY. 211 Of these, six — OhoJclla (Avicula ?) clesquamata (Hall), 0. (Orbicidaf) crrtHsa (H.), 0. {Orhicula) cadata (H.), Metoj)- torria ri(gosa{H.), Theca trianguhti^is (R.), imd Agiwstus lohafus (H.) — were fiu'ured and described in the first volume of the Pa- Igeontology of New York in 1847, from this locality; and two — ConoceplKiUtes {Atops) trillneatns (Emm.) and Olcndlus (EUip- tocepludas) asaphoides (E.),* from Greenwich, Washington county. All the rest are new or undescribed. f Desirins: further information in regard to certain of these new species, I several months since wrote Mr. E. Billings, Palaeontolo- gist of the Geological Survey of Canada, at the same time giving him a list of the species in my possession from this quarter. In reply Mr. B. informed me that he was just engaged upon a col- lection of new fossils from the Lower Potsdam formation below Quebec, which he strongly suspected to be identical with my own : and on comparison it was found that fifteen out of the eighteen species from Troy Avere held by us in common, and shown to be perfectly identical. Such an unlooked-for result of course sur- prised us greatly. That the Lower Potsdam formation below Quebec, and the western portion of the Taconic series near Troy are of the same age, there seems now but little room for doubt. Two very characteristic fossils of this formation are the oper- cula of two species of IlijoJithes, upon which I communicated a * These two species, to which great interest has long attaclied, were, until quite recently, supposed to be confined to an exposure of the '' Black Slate" of Dr. Emmons, about two miles north of Bald Mountain, N.Y., where they were first discovered by Dr. Asa Fitch of Salem, N. Y., so long ago as the year 1844. Owing to the imperfec- tion of the specimens furnislied by that locality, however, their tiue relations have long been considered doubtful among geologists. But the state of preservation m which they are now found in Innestone leaves no longer a doubt as to tiieir true affinities. Good specimens of these species are comparatively rare in the limestones at Troy, though fragments of large individuals of the Olenelius asaphoides are very common. I am indebted to Mr. Billings for having pointed out to me the specific identity of the Troy speciiuens with the Afops and Elliplocephalus — an acknowledgment which was unintentionally omit- ted in this paper as originally published. As it is, however, about to be republished in the " Xaturaltst and Geologist ^^^ I gladly i-mbrace this opportunity to set the matter right. f Unless one of tliem should prove identical with the species of Cypricardia figured by Kmmons (American Geology, p. 113, plate I, fig 1.) 212 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. VI. note in the preceding number of this Journal. One of them was there described as a ''minute, circular species, with four pairs of lateral muscular impressions and two smaller dorsal, all radiating from a point near one side;" the other as "larger, and like a Dlscina on the outside." The former occurs quite abundantly in the Troy limestones, and is a very beautiful little object. It varies in size from a mere point to a diameter of three lines. Perfect specimens have a rich, polished appearance. The other occurs more rarely. As might naturally be expected, these rocks contain immense numbers of Ili/oUthes. Indeed, large portions of the limestone are often almost wholly composed of them. Without doubt this formation in New York will yet afford many new species. ^'^ The even-bedded limestone east of Troy, to which especial attention has been given, as well as portions of the conglomerates, are literally loaded with fossils, and promise richly to repay investigation for a long time to come. Their associated slates, shales and sandstones have as yet afforded no fossils. Near Lansingburgh. however, where what is at present regarded as a lower member of the formation, consisting of heavy and thin-bed- ded gray sandstones with interstratitied black slates, is exposed, a few obscure Fucoids have been found, but these rocks have been but imperfectly investigated. Neither the thickness nor precise eastern limit of this formation has yet been ascertained. Troy, N. Y., May 24, 1871. * These rocks have hitherto been referred, thougli with some doubt, to the Calciferous portion of the Quebec Group ; but all modern investigations in our older strata have .steadily pointed to their higher antiquity ; and it is simply justice to state that, by several geologists besides those who have adopted Prof. Emmons' views of their age,, this has long been guspected. No. 2.] BILLINGS — PALEOZOIC FOSSILS- 213 ON SOME NEW SPECIES OF PAL^OZOLC FOSSILS. By E. Billings, F.G.S. © Fig. 1. Ilyolithes communis. 2. H. Americanus. 3. H. ? micans. 4. H. princeps. In these diagrams a i\'presents the rate of tapering of the shell on the ventral side ; b, the transverse section (except in 3 6, which is the inner surface of an operculum enlarged two diame- ters). The small figure in 3 a represents tlie apical portion of a specimsn. N.B. — All these species vary slightly in the rate of taper- ing. Genus Hyolithes, Eichwald. In the following description of new species of Ili/olithes, I shall call the side of the fossil which is most flittened, or from which there is a projection in front of the aperture, '- the ventral side." Directly opposite is the " dorsum." The lateral walls, whether consisting of two sloping planes, as in fig. 2, or rounded as in the other figures, I shall designate simply •' the sides." The '• width " of the aperture is the greatest distance between the two most projecting points of the sides. This is sometimes close to the ventral side as in tig. 2. The '- depth " is the distance between the median line of the ventral side and the dorsum, and is at right angles to the width. That part of the ventral side which projects beyond the aperture is the " lower lip." The " ventral limb " of the operculum is that side which is in contact with the lower lip, when the operculum is in place, in the aperture. The 214 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. " dorsal limb " is the opposite side of the operculum, in contact with the dorsum. In some of the opercula there is a point around which the surface markings are arranged concentrically ; this is the " nucleus." The following species occur in the pebbles and boulders of a coni2;lomerate which constitutes an important formation on the south shore of the St. Lawrence below Quebec. The age of the rock in which these pebbles are found, is not yet certainly de- termined, but it is, at all events, near that of the Potsdam. H. COMMUNIS. — This species attains a length of about eighteen lines, although the majority of the specimens are from ten to fifteen lines in length. The ventral side is flat (or only slightly convex) for about two-thirds the width, and then rounded up to the sides. The latter are uniformly convex. The dorsum, al- though depressed convex, is never distinctly flattened, as is the ventral side. The lower lip projects forward for a distance equal to about one-fourth or one-third -the depth of the sliell. In a specimen whose width is three lines the depth is two lines and a- half. The operculum is nearly circular, gently but irregularly con- vex, externally and concave within. The ventral limb is seen on the outside as an obscurely triangular, slightly elevated space, the apex of the triangle being situated nearly in the centre of the operculum. The base of the triangle forms the ventral margin. This limb occupies about one-third of the whole superficies of the external surface. The remainder, constituting the dorsal limb, is nearly flat, slightly elevated from the margin towards the centre. On each side of the apex of the ventral limb there is a slight depression, running from the nucleus out to the edge. On the inside there is an obscure ridge, corresponding to each one of the external depressions. It is most prominent where it reaches the edge. These two ridges meet at the centre, and divide the whole of the inner surface of the operculum into two nearly equal portions. The surface of the operculum is concentrically striated. The shell itself in some of the specimens is covered with fine longi- tudinal striae, from five to ten in the width of a line. The shell varies in thickness in diflerent individuals. In some it is thiu and composed of a single layer, but in others it is much thickened by concentric laminae, and thus approaches the structure of a Salterella. There are also fine engirdling striae, and sometimes obscure sub-imbricating rings of growth. No. 2.] BILLINGS — PALEOZOIC FOSSILS. 215 This species has been found at Bio and St. Simon. Fig. 1, 6, representing the transverse section, is not so distinctly flattened on the ventral side as it is in most specimens. Collected by T. C. Weston. H. Americanos. — Length from twelve to eighteen lines, tapering at the rate of about four lines to the inch. Section triangular, the three sides flat, slightly convex or slightly con- cave, the dorsal and lateral edges either quite sharp or acutely rounded. Lower lip rounded, projecting about two lines in full- grown individuals. Surface finely striated, the striae curving forwards on the ventral sides, and p;issing upwards on the sides at nearly a right angle, curve slightly backwards on the dorsum. In a specimen eighteen lines in length, the width of the aperture is about six lines and the depth about four, the proportions being elightl}' variable. The operculum has a very well-defined conical ventral limb, the apex ofw'hich is situated above the centre, or nearer the dorsal than the ventral side. The dorsal limb forms a flat mar- gin, and is so situated that w^hen the operculum is in place, the plane of this flat border must be nearly at right angles to the longitudinal axis of the shell. In an operculum six lines wide, the height of the lower limb to the apex of the cone, is two and a-half lines, and the width of the flat border, which constitutes the dorsal limb, about one line. This species occurs at Bic and St. Simon ; also at Troy, N.Y., where it has been found abundantly by Mr. S. W. Ford of that city. It is Theca triangularis of Hail, Pal. N.Y., vol. I., p. 213, 18-17. As that name was preoccupied by a species previously described by Col. Portlock, Geol. Rep. on Londonderry, p. 375, pi. 28 A, fig. 3a, 3/->, 3c, 1843, it must be changed. It is a very abundant species, and varies a good deal. The Canadian specimens were collected by T. C. Weston. H. MICANS. — This is a lonii' slender cylindrical species, with a nearly circular section. The rate of ttipering is so ."^mnll, that it amounts to scarcely half a line in length of eighteen lines, w^here the width of the tube is from one to two lines. Tiie lar- gest specimen collected is two and a-half lines wide at the larger extremity, and if perfect would be four or five inches in length. The operculum does not show distinctly a division into a dor- sal and ventral limb. It is of an ovate form, depth somewhat greater than the width, the nucleus about one-third the depth 216 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. Vol. vi.] from the dorsal margin. Externally it is gently concave in the ventral two-thirds of the surface ; a space around the nucleus is convex, and finely striated concentrically. On the inner surface there is a small pit at the dorsal third of the depth, indicating the position of the nucleus. From this point radiate ten elongate ovate scurs, arranged in the form of a star, the rays towards the ventral side being the longest. None of these sciirs quite reach the margin. The shell and operculum are thin and of a finely lamellar structure, smooth and shining. Occurs at Bic and St. Simon ; also at Troy, N.Y. Collectors, T. C. Weston and S. W. Ford. Sometimes numerous small specimens from half a line to three lines in length are found with the operculum on the same slab. This shell appears to m3 at present to constitute a new genus, differing from the majority of the species of Hyolitlies in its cir- cular section, the operculum not divided into dorsal and ventral lines, and in the remarkable system of muscular impressions on the interior. Burrande has figured an operculum of the same type, differing from this in having only three instead of five pairs of impressions. They are, however, arranged on the same plan in both the Canadian and Bohemian species.* It is possible that our species may be a Salferella. H. PRINCEPS. — Shell laro'e, sometimes attainins: a lens-th of three or four inches, tapering at the rate of about three lines to the inch. In perfectly symmetrical specimens, the transverse section is nearly a semicircle, the ventral side being almost flat, usually with a slight convexity, and the sides and the dorsum uniformly rounded. In many of the individuals, however, one side is more abruptly rounded than the other, in consequence of which the median line of the dorsum is not directly over that of the ventral side, and the specimen seems distorted. This is not the result of pressure, but is the original form of the shell. Some- times, also, there is a rounded groove along the median line of the dorsum. The latter is somewhat more narrowly rounded than the sides. Lower lip uniformly convex, and projecting about three lines in a large specimen. Surface with fine striae and sm dl sub-imbricating ridges of growth. These curve for- wards on the ventral side. In passing upwards on the sides, they ♦ Systeme Silurian, &c., vol. III., pi. 9, fig 16 H, and fig. 17. No. 2.] BILLINGS — PALEOZOIC FOSSILS. 217 at first slope backwards from the ventral edge, and then turn upwards and pass over the dorsum at a right angle to the length. When the width of the aperture is seven lines, the depth is about five. The operculum has not been identified. Collected by T. C. Weston at Bic and St. Simon. Genus Obolella, Billings. 5 6 7 .-9 .9: Fig. 5. Interior of the ventral valve of 0. gemma, enlarged abont five diameters, acr, the two small scars at the hinge ; bb, the two central scars ; c, the small pit near the hinge ; dd, the two principal muscular scars ; g, the groove in the area. 6. Interior of the ventral valve of O. desquamata. Hall,* enlarged 2J diameters. 7. Interior of the ventral valve of Oboliis Apollinis, Eichwald, copied from Davidson's " Introduction to the study of the fossil Brachiopoda." Generic Characters. — Shell unarticulated, ovate or sub- orbicular, lenticular, smooth, concentrically or radiately striated, sometimes reticulated by both radiate and concentric striae. Ventral valve with a solid beak and a small more or less distinctly grooved area. In the interior of the ventral valve there are two elongated sub-linear or petaloid muscular impressions, which ex- tend from near the hinge line forward, sometimes to points in front of the mid-leno;th of the shell. These are either straii>;ht or curved, parallel with each other or diverging towards the front. Between these, about the middle of the shell, is a pair of small impressions, and close to the hinge line a third pair, likewise small, and often indistinct. There is also, at least in some species, a small pit near the hinge line, into which the groove of the area seems to terminate. In the dorsal valve there are six impressions * Engraved from a figure kindly drawn for me by Thos. Davidson, Esq., F.R.S., of Brighton, England. The specimen is from the origi- nal locality of the species, Troy, N.Y. Collected by T. C. Weston 218 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. corresponding to those of the ventral valve, and sometimes an obscure rounded ridsre alono; the median line. If we compare the interior of the ventral valve of an OhoJella with that of Obolus AjjoUinis, we see that there are six muscular impressions in each, but not arranged in the same manner. The two small scars aa at the hinge line are most probably the same in both 2;enera. The two lateral scars hb of Obolus have no homoiogue in Obolella, unless they be represented by the two large ones dd. Should this be the case, however, the great diffe- rence in their position, would no doubt be of generic value. I think it more probable that the large scars dd of Obolella repre- present the central pair cc of Obolus. Again, Eichwald says that in the interior of the ventral valve of 0. Aj)ollonis there is a longitudinal septum (shown in the above fig. 7 at s), w^hich sepa- rates the two adductors cc, and extends to the cardinal groove (I suppose he means the groove g on the area).* No such sep- tum occurs in any species of Obolella. I have not seen any de- scription of the dorsal valve of the 0. Appollinis sufiiciently perfect to afford a means of comparison with that of Obolella^ but the differences in the ventral valve alone are so great that the two genera can scarcely be identical. They are, however, closely related, and occur in nearly the same geological horizon. In the rocks below Quebec and at the Straits of Belle Isle, we find the following species of _Obok'lla : — 1. 0. desquamata, Hall, .- Avicula f desquamafa, Pal. N.Y., vol. 1, p. 292, pi. 80, fig. 2. Occurs at Troy, N. Y. . 2. 0. crassa, Hall = Orbicula f cnissa, op. cit. p. 299, pi. 79, fig. 8. Occurs at Troy. 3. 0. coelata^ Hall, = Orbicula coslafa, op. cit. p. 290, pi. 79, fig. 9. Occurs at Troy. 4. 0. gemma, n. sp. 5. 0. Circe, n. sp. 6. 0. chroma fieri, Billings, has been found as yet only at the Straits of Belle Isle. The following are new species : 0. GEMMA. — Shell very small, about two or three lines in length, ovate, both valves moderately convex and nearly smooth. * Speakini;- of the adductors, he Sciys : " Une crute longitudinal occupe le milieu des dernieres impressions ct arrive jusqu'au sillon cardinal.'' (Lelhea Rossica, vol. 1, p. 925.) No. 2.] KILLINGS — PALAEOZOIC FOSSILS, 219 Ventral valve ovate, the anterior margin broadly rounded, with sometimes a portion in the middle nearly straight ; greatest width at about one-third the length from the front, thence tapering with gently convex or nearly straight sides to the beak, which is acutely rounded. The area is about one-fifth or one-sixth the whole length of the shell, with a comparatively deep groove, which ex- tends to the apex of the beak. The dorsal valve is nearly circu- lar, obscurely angular at the beak, and rather more broadly rounded at the front margin than at the sides. In the interior of the ventral valve there are two small muscular impressions of a lunate form, close to the cardinal margin, one on each side of the median line. A second pair consists of two elongate sub-linear scars, which extend from the posterior third of the length of the shell to points situated at about one-fourth the length from the front margin. These scars are nearly straight, parallel or slightly diverging forwards, and divide the shell longi- tudinally into three nearly equal portions. Between them, about the middle of the shell, are two other small obscurely defined impressions. There is also a small pit close to the hinge line and in the median line of the shell. In the interior of the dorsal valve there is an obscure rounded ridge which runs from the beak along the median line almost to the front margin. Close to the hinge line there is a pair of small scars, one on each side of the ridge. The other impressions in this valve have not been made out. The surface of both valves is in general nearly smooth, but when well preserved shows some obscure concentric striae. This species is closely allied to 0. chromatlca, the species on which the genus was founded, only differing from it, so far as the external characters are concerned, in being much smaller, and the beak of the ventral valve more extended. Occurs at Bic and St. Simon. Collected by T. C. Weston. 0. CiiiGE. — Ovate, front and sides uniformly rounded, posterior extremity more narrowly rounded than the front, length and width about equal, greatest width at the mid-length, rather strongly and uniformly convex, surface nearly smooth, but with fine concentric striae. Length seven lines, width a little less. The rostral por- tion of the shell is much thickened for about one-fifth the leni'th, and in this part there is a deep and wide groove. In front of the thickened portion the muscular impressions are indistinctly 220 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi, seen, but appear to be formed on the same plan as those of the ventral valve of the genus. The above description is drawn up on one exterior, and several interiors of the same valve, apparently the ventral valve. The exterior is very like that of 0. desquamata, and is of the same size, but the interior shows it to be an entirely distinct species. Length of the largest specimen seen, seven lines ; width about the same, or slightly less. Occurs at Trois Pistoles. Collected by T. C. Weston. Platyceras prim^vum. — Shell minute, consisting of about two whorls, which as seen from above are ventricose, but most narrowly rounded at the suture ; the inner whorl scarcely elevated above the outer. The under side is not seen in the specimen. Diameter, measured from the outer lip across to the opposite side, one line ; width of last whorl at the aperture, about one-third of a line. Collected at Bic by T. C. Weston. (Proposed new genus of Brachiopoda.) Genus Monomerella, N. Gt. Generic characters. — Shell unarticulated, ovate or orbicu- lar; ventral valve with a large area and with muscular impres- sions like those of Trlmerella. Dorsal valve with muscular impressions in the central and posterior portion of the shell, nearly like those of Oholus. In the ventral valve there is only a single septum, which extends from the cardinal line a greater or less distance forwards. There are two cavities in the shell beneath the area. In the dorsal valve there are no cavities in the shell. The main difference between this genus and Trime- rella are. thus, as follows : — Trimerella. — Cavities in both valves. Monomerella. — Cavities in the ventral valve but none in the dorsal. The above description is intended to be merely introductory. As Mr. D.ividson will soon fully describe and illustrate the genus from both Canadian and Swedish specimens, no more need be said about it here. This genus was discovered in the spring of 1871, at Hespelar, Ontario, in the Guelph limestone, by T. C. Weston. Before No. 2.J BILLINGS — PALEOZOIC FOSSILS. 221 venturiug to describe it, I sent a specimen to Mr. Davidson, and on returning it he stated that he considered it to be a new genus, " very closely allied to Trhnerdla.'' Lately I received a letter from him in which he states that he has obtained the same genus from Wisby, Island of Gothland, and he requested me to name it, as he was about to publish the Swedish species. We have two distinct species, both occurring in the Guelph limestone. This formation I consider to be about the age of the Aymestry limestone of the English geologists. I shall charac- terize our species briefly as follows. Full descriptions and figures will be given hereafter. M. PRISCA. — Ventral valve ovate, greatest width at about the anterior third of the length, thence tapering with gently convex sides to the narrowly rounded beak ; front margin broadly rounded ; septum about one- third the length of the shell. Dorsal valve about one-fourth shorter than the ventral, and more broadly rounded at the anterior extremity. On a side view the outline of the ventral valve would be, so far as we can iudoe from a cast of the interior, somewhat straight, or only gently arched from the beak to the front margin. The dorsal valve, on the other hand, is rather strongly convex, most prominent in the anterior half. It is evident that the general cavity of the shell of the dorsal valve extends a short distance under the area. Length of ventral valve, eighteen lines ; greatest width, thirteen or fourteen lines ; length of dorsal valve about fourteen lines. There are some fragments in the collection which indicate a larger size. Occurs in tlie Guelph limestone at Ilespelar, Ontario. Col- lected by T. C. Weston. M. ORBICULARIS. — Broadly ovate, nearly circular, lenticular, both valves moderately convex ; septum about one-third the length. The casts seem to show that a thin plate extends for- wards a short distance from the cardinal edge, supported by the septum. The length and width appear to be about twelve or fifteen lines. Occurs with M. j^risca. T. C. Weston, collector. Both Trimerella and Monomerella are sub-genera of Obolus. There is, besides the above, a third group which differs from the other two in having no cavitias in either valve. It includes 222 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. the species I have called Obohis Canadensis and 0. Galfensls. For this group I would propose the name Obolellina. It differs from Oholus ApoUinis in the form of the area of the ven- tral valve, and in having a small pair of muscular impressions in the dorsal valve, in front of the large central pair. In all three of these sub genera, there are species which have the large muscu- lar impressions of the ventral valve obliquely striated or grooved. This seems to show that the muscles were not single but composed of several bands. The three genera pass gradually into each other, and yet I think some sort of a subdivision is required. It seems almost absurd to place such shells as T. grandis and 0. Canadensis in the same generic group. NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY. FIELD DAY AT MONTARVILLE. The fourth of these social gatherings took place on Saturday, June 3rd, the place selected being Montarville, or as it is com- monly called, Boucherville Mountain. The weather being pro- pitious, about one hundred persons assembled at the Bonaventure Street Station, at 9 a.m., from whence they were conveyed by a special train to Boucherville Station, wdiich was reached about 10.15. From this point vehicles of various descriptions conveyed the excursionists to the grove near the lake on the grounds of Madame Bruneau, the lady of the manor. When all were assem- bled together, the President, Principal Dawson, stated that parties would be formed to examine, respectively, the geological features, the zoology, and the botany of the mountain. Principal Dawson, Dr. T. Sterry Hunt, and Mr. A. R. C. Selwyn, undertook the direction of the geological party ; Mr. Whiteaves was deputed to lead the zoological expedition ; but as no botanist was forthcoming to explain the points of interest in the various plants that might be met with, Mr. S: J. Lyman volunteered to act as guide to those who wished to ascend the mountain. Each party took a different direction, with the understanding that all were to meet again at the lake at 2 p.m. The results obtained by the geologists will be found described in Dr. Hunt's and Principal Dawson's remarks farther on. It may be mentioned, however, that on the way Principal Dawson picked up two pieces of rock of Hudson River No. 2.] FIELD DAY AT MONTARVILLE. 223 group age, one containing a portion of a crinoidal column, the other specimens of Orth'is tcstudlnarla and Leptmna scricea. The folknvers of Mr. Lyman failed to reach the summit of the hill opposite the lake, and on their return many could sympa- thise with the plaint of Beattie's Minstrel, ''Ah wliu can tell hoic hird it is to climbr The zoologists formed a sm-iU but compact body, and looked as if they meant business. A large number of chipmunks were seen during the day, and several of their curious underground burrows were met with. The birds noticed were the black-billed cuckoo, Coccygupi eri/throj)hfh((lmns ; the gold-winged woodpecker, Colaptes aumtus ; the ruby-throated liumming-bird, Trochilus coluhrls ; the tyrant flycatcher, Tyndiims Carollnensis ; the golden-crowned thrush, Seiurus (lurocapiUas ; the yellow-rumped and the black-throated green warblers, Dendroica coronata and virens ; the red-eyed and the warbling vireo, Vino oUvnceus and gil-h meetino-, August, 1871. The com- mittee consists of Henry Woodward, F.G.S., F Z.S., Dr. Duncan, F.R.8., and R. Etheridge, F.R.S. The report was drawn up by Mr. Woodward. ''Since noticing the occurrence of an Isopod (Pakega CarterV)^ from the Kentish, Cambridge, and Bedford Chalk, Dr. Ferd. Roemer, of Breslau, has forwarded me the cast of a specimen of the same Crustacean from the Chalk of LTpper Silesia. This, together with the example from the Miocene of Turin, gives a very wide geographical as well as chronological range to this genus. A still more remarkable extension of the Isopoda in time is caused by the discovery of the form which I have named Proearc- turus in the Devonian of Herefordshire, apparently the remains of a gigantic Isopod resembling the modern Arcturus Baffinsii. I have also described from the Lower Ludlow a form which I have referred with some doubt to the Amphipoda, under the oene- ric name of Necrogamynarus. Representatives both of the Isopoda and Amphipoda will doubt- less be found in numbers in our Palaeozoic rocks, seeing that Macrouran Decapods are found as far back as the Coal-measures * and Brachyurous forms in the Oolites. f * Indeed the suggestion made by Mr. Billings as to the Trilobita being furnished with legs (see Quart. Journ. Geol Soc, vol. xxvi., pi. 21, fig. 1), if established upon further evidence, so as to be applied to the whole class, would carry the Isopodous type back in time to our earliest Cambrian rocks. I propose to carry out an investigation of this group for the purpose of confirming Mr. Billings's and my own observations, by the examination of a longer series of specimens than have hitherto * Anthrapalsemon Grossartii, Salter, Coal-measurevS, Glasgow, t Palseinachus longipes, H. Woodw., Forest Marble, Wilts. 228 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. been dealt with. In the meantime the authenticity of the con- clusions arrived at by Mr. Billings having been called in question by Drs. D ma, Verrill, and Smith (see the American Journ, of Science for May last, p. 320 ; Annals and Mag. Nat. Hist, for May, p. 366). I have carefully considered their objections, and have replied to the same in the Geological Magazine for July last, p. 289, PI. VIII.; and I may be permitted here to briefly state the arguments pro and con, seeing they are of the greatest importance in settling the systematic position of the Trilobita amonir the Crustacea, Until the discovery of the remains of ambulatory appendages by Mr. Billings in an Asnplius from the Trenton Limestone (in 1870), the only appendage heretofore detected associated with any Trilobite was the hypostome or lip-plate. From its close agreement with the lip-plate in the recent Apus, nearly all naturalists who have paid attention to the Trilobita in the past thirty years have concluded that they possessed only soft membranaceous gill-feet, similar to those of Branchipus, Apns, and other Phyllopods. The type-number of segments in Crustacea is 20 or 21. In all the higher forms, as in the Decapoda, Stomapoda, Isopoda, etc., several of these segments are coalesced either in the head, thorax, or abdomen, so that we never meet with a Crustacean having 21 distinctly -marked segments until we arrive at the Branchiopoda and Phyllopoda, many of which have their full number of separate segments. In the Trilobita, a very variable number of body-rings is met with, from 6 even to 26 (in Harpes iinguJa, Sternb.), so that on that account alone the Trilobita must be considered as a much lower type than the Isopoda, in which the body-segments are usually seven in number. There seems, however, no good reason against the conclusion that the Trilobita were an earlier and more generalized type of Crustacea from which the latter and more specialized Isopoda have arisen. The large compound sessile eyes, and the hard, shelly, many- seo-mented body, with its compound caudal and head shield, differ from any known Phyllopod, but offer many points of analogy with the modern Isopodn, and one would be led to presuppose the Tri- lobites possessed of organs of locomotion of a stronger texture than mere branchial frills. The objection raised by Drs. Dana and Verrill to the special No. 2.] GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY. 229 case of appendages in the Asaj^hus assumed by Mr. Billings to possess ambulatory legs, is, that the said appendages were merely the semicalcified arches in the integument of the sternum to which the true appendages were attached. A comparison, which these gentlemen have themselves sugges- ted, between the abdomen of a Macrourau Decapod and the Trilobite in question, is the best refutation of their own argument. The sternal arches in question are firmly united to each tergal , piece at the margin, not along the median ventral line. If, then, the supposed legs of the Trilobite correspond to these semicalcified arches in the Macrouran Decapod, they might be expected to lie irregularly along the median line, but to unite with the tergal pieces at the lateral border of each somite. In the fossil we find just the contrary is the case; for the organs in question occupy a definite position on either side of a median line along the ventral surface, but diverge widely from their corresponding tergal pieces at each lateral border, being directed forward and outward in a very similar position to that in which we should expect legs Qtot sternal arches) to lie beneath the body rings of a fossil crustacean* The presence, however, of semicalcified sternal arches presupposes the possession of stronger organs than mere foliaceous gill-feet; whilst the broad shield-shaped caudal plate suggests most strongly the position of the branchias. In the case of the Trenton Asa- 2)has I shall be satisfied if it appears, from the arguments I have put forward, that they are most prohahly legs — feeling assured that more evidence ought to be demanded, before deciding- on the systematic position of so large a group as the Trilobita from only two specimens. 'i' With regard to the embryology and development of the modern King-Crab {Limnlus poli/phemus) ^ we must await the conclusions of Dr. Anton Dohrn before deciding as to the affinities presented by its larval stages to certain of the Trilobita, such relations being only in general external form. Dr. Packard (Reports of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Au- gust, 1870) remarks, '' The whole embryo bears a very near resemblance to certain genera of Trilobites, as Triniideus, Asa- phiis, and others;" and he adds, " previous to hatching it strik- ingly resembles Triniideus and other Trilobites, suiriiestins: that the two groups should, on embryonic and structural grounds, be included in the same order, especially now that Mr. E. Billings * One in Canada, and cue in the British Museum, hoth of the same species. 230 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. has demonstrated that Asaphus possessed eight pairs of five-jointed legs of uniform size." Such statements are apt to mislead, unless we carefully compare the characters of each group. And first let me express a caution against the too hasty construction of a classification based upon larval characters. Larval characters are useful guide-posts in defining great groups, and also in indicating affinities between great groups ; but the more we become acquainted with larval forms the greater will be our tendency (if we attempt to base our classification on their study) to merge groups together which we had before held to be distinct. To take a familiar instance : if we compare the larval stages of the common Shore-Crab (^Carcinus moenas) with Pteri/gotus, we should be obliged (according to the arguments of Dr. Packard) to place them near to or in the same group. The eyes in both are sessile, the functions of locomotion, prehension^and mastication are all performed by one set of appen- dages, which are attached to the mouth ; the abdominal segments in both are natatory, but destitute of any appendages. Such characters, however, are common to the larvae of many Crustaceans widely separated when adult, the fact being that in the larval stage we find in this group, what has been so often observed by naturalists in other groups of the animal kingdom, namely, a shadowing forth in the larval stages. of the road along which its ancestors travelled ere they arrived from the remote past at the living present. If we place the characters o^ Limulus and Pterygotus, side by side, and also those of Trilobita and Isopoda, we shall find they may be, in the present state of our knowledge, so retained in classification. I. Limulus (Fossil and living). 1. Eye.s sesijile, compoimd. 2. Ocelli distinctly seen. 3. All the limps serving as mouth- organs. 4. All the thoracic segments bear- ing the branchiee or reproduc- tive organs. 5. Other segments destitute of any appendages. 6. Thoracic segments anchylosed. 7. Abdominal segments anchylosed and rudimentary. 8. Metastoma, rudimentary . PterygotHs (Fossil, extinct). 1. Eyes sessile, compound. 2. Ocelli distinctly seen. 3. All the limbs serving as mouth- organs 4. Anterior WiOv?iC\c segments bear- ing branchice or reproductive organs. 5. Other segments destitute of any appendages. 6. Thoracic segments unanchylosed. 7. Abdominal segments free and well developed. 8. Metastoma, large. No. 2.] GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY. 231 II. Trilobita (Fossil, extinct). 1. Eyes sessile, compound. 2. No ocelli visible. 3. (Ai)pendages partly or;il, partly ambulatory, arranged in pairs). 4. Thoracic segments variable in number^ from 6 even to 26, free and movable (animal some- times rolling in a ball). 5. Al)dominal somites coalesced forming broad caudal shield (bearing the branchice be- neath). 6. Lip-plate, icell developed. Should our further researches confirm Mr. Billings's discovery fully, we may propose for the second pair of these groups a common designation (as in the case of the Merostomata) ; mean- time, the above may serve as representing the present state of our knowledae. Isopoda (Fossil, and living). 1. Eyes sessile, compound. 2. No ocelli visible. 3. Append;ig\s partly oral partly ambulatory, arranged in pairs. 4. Thoracic segments usually se- ven, free and movable (animal sometimes rolling in a ball). 5. Abdominal somites coalesced, forming broad caudal shield, bearing the branchias beneath. 6. Lip-plate, small. BOTANY AND ZOOLOGY. Popular Names of Plants. — Botanists generally ignore the use of any other than scientific names for plants, because it leads to a great deal of confusion in their nomenclature, the same name being frequently applied to two or more plants of entirely different species, and sometimes of widely separated genera ; and in other cases the same plant will receive a dozen or more names, varying in difi'erent countries, and even in various sections of the same country, among people speaking the .same language. For precise nomenclature, therefore, the names given by acknowledged authorities in the botanical world have to be accepted by amateurs and professional men. Nevertheless, the popular names of plants are not merely empirical, but are founded, as the scientific names are founded, upon some peculiar feature or use 'of the plant. Of late years these popular names have become the object of very interesting research, as throwing much light upon ethnolo- gical history, the antiquity of various nations, and the migra- tions of the larger tribes of men. We can not, of course, go into a lengthy account of these matters, or give the derivation of all the popular names in use — it would require a large volume to do this; but we will give a few examples of the results of the 232 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. researches made as to the names of some common trees and phmts. With the exception of the hazel-nut, and some other wild berries, the Apple appears to be the only fruit known to our European ancestors, as it is the only name not derived from the Latin or French. In the Zend, or old Persian language, and in the Sanscrit, the name for water is ap^ and for fruit p'hala ; hence ethnologists think that the name is compounded of these two words, meaning "water fruit," or '-juice fruit." This corresponds with the Latin ncixaQ pomum, derived from ^jo, to drink, which is a somewhat curious coincidence. In Welsh it was formerly called apalis, now ap)fd ; in high-German, aphol ; in German, ap/el ; in Anglo-Saxon, cepl, or, apjjel ; in old Danish, epii ; in modern Danish, cf-^/e ; in Swedish, (;f;^?e ; and in Lithuanian, oboli/s, or ohelis. This close similarity in the name as used by these various nations, renders it highly probable that they all come from the same root or stock, and that such root or stock originally inhabited the western spur of the Himalayan Mountains or northern Persia, Again, the name of Beech-tree, given to the Fagus sylvutica, is another curious proof of our descent from Asiatic nations. In Sanscrit the word boko signifies a letter, and the word hokos writinsjs. In Swedish the name of the Beech-tree is hok : in Danish, hog; in Dutch, henk ; in German, huch ; in modern high-German, huoche ; in old high-German, puocha ; and in Anglo-Saxon, hoc, hece, and beoce — names applied indifferently to this tree and to a book, because the ancient books of these different nations were w^ritten in their Buiiic characters upon tablets or leaves made from the bark of this tree. Ethnoloi>'ists, therefore, consider this as another proof of our descent from the nations of TJj)per Asia, the more so as the use by the Greeks of the word biblos, as signifying a book, is derived from the name of an Egyptian plant that was used in making the material upon which they wrote, showing that our ancestors received their ancient alphabetic signs from India by the way of the north, and not by a southern route. As a curious example of the way in which the names of plants become transmitted in passing from one language to another, we instance one of the names of the Carnation, or Dian- tlius caryopJu/llus. Chaucer, in his Canterburij Tales, speaks of " A primerole, a piggesnie." This last word, the glossaries state, means "pig's-eye," the first cue meaning the primrose. Now No. 3.] BOTANY AND ZOOLOGY. 233 " piggesnie " really means Whitsuntide Pink, and comes from the German words Fingsten, or Pjingst, derived from a Greek word for fiftieth, meaniug the fiftieth day after Easter, and eye from the French oeilht, a Pink. The word Fingsten^ therefore, has reference to the time of its blooming, and eye to the circular markings io the flower, and thus F'uikstenei/e has passed into Figgesnie. The Viold tricolor, or Pansy, is an instanc3 of numerous and various names being applied to the same plant. The above name comes from the French word pensee. Because it has three colors in the same flower it is cjilled " Three faces under a hood," and also " Herb Trinity; " and from its coloring, '' Flame Flower." It is also called " Heart's-ease," but this name properly belongs to the AVallflower, which was formerly called girojiee, or Clove Flower, because cloves were in former times considered good for diseases of the heart. Of amatory names, the Pansy has prob- ably more than any other plant; we name a few of them : "Kiss Me ere I Rise," "Kiss Me at the Garden Gate," "Jump up and Kiss Me," "Cuddle Me to You," "Tittle my Fancy," "Pink of my John," "Love in Idle," or "in Vain," "Love in Idleness," and many others. The old herbalists were 2;reat believers in the doctrine of si";- natures ; by which they meant that some particular character or habit of the plant indicated its medical use. Thus the spotted leaves of the Pulmonaria indicated that it was a remedy for pul- monary con)plaints; the tubers of the roots of Serophularia, being hard and knotty, must be good for glandular affections, and because the Saxifrage i^rows in the clefts of the rocks it must be good for stone in the bladder. They even ascribed dif- ferent qualities to various parts of the same plants. An old author says : " The seed of garlic is black ; it darkens the eyes with blackness and obscurity. This is to be understood of healtliy eyes. But those which are dull through vicious humi- dity, from those garlic drives it away. The skin of garlic is red ; it expels blood. It has a hollow stem, and therefore helps affec- tions of the windpipe." Some common names are the embodiment of some poetic thought of our forefathers, as the Daisy, Belle's-perennis, which comes from the Anglo-Saxon dccges-eage, or the old English Dai- esey-ghe, meaning the eye of day, because its flowers are only 234 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. VI. open in the day time; though some derive the name from dais, a canopy, from the shape of the flower, as in the line, " The daisie did unbraid her crownaU small " — crownall meaning coronal, the upper part of a canopy. Other names derive their origin from the uses to which the plant is put, as the Dogwood ; which is not named after the ani- mal, but because the wood was formerly used for making skew- ers, the proper name being dawkwood, or skewer-wood, this name coming from the Anglo-Saxon dale or dole; German, dolch ; Spanish, daga ; French, dague ; and old English, dugge. A curious instance of confusion and transposition of names is to be found in the Forget-me-not, as this name has only been given to the pretty blue Myosotis within the past forty or fifty years. For more than two hundred years the name had been given by the English to the AJuga chamcepifj/s, or Ground-pine, on account of the unpleasant taste it leaves in the mouth. Some of the German botanists and herbalists gave the name to a plant known botanically as Teucrium Botrijs- Id Denmark and some parts of Germany the name was applied to the Speedwell or Ver- onica chamoedrya, and by others to GnapTialiuin leontopodium. The name appears properly to belong to the Veronica, having reference to the way in which the flowers fall ofi" and are blown away as soon as it is gathered ; hence the valediction '-'Speed- well," "Farewell," " Good-by," '-Forget-me-not," etc., as ap- plied to this plant. The later application was brought about by the legend in a story of modern date in which a drowning lover snatches it from the river bank, and as he sinks throws it ashore, as a token of remembrance. J. H. in " Hearth and Home." MISCELLANEOUS. OBITUARY. — SIR RODERICK IMPEY MURCHISON, BART., K.C.B., LL.D., D.C.L., M.A., F.R.S., F.G.S., &C., &C., &C. The death of Sir Roderick Murchison, although at the ripe a^e of 80 years, is a loss which Geologists and Geographers are alike called upon to mourn. In relation to both these sciences, he has for many years justly occupied the most prominent positi- ons. But, apart from his high social and scientific standing, he was a man full of genial and kindly feeling, who could be readily No. 2.] MISCELLANEOUS. 235 approached ; and those who knew him most intimately acknow- ledge that he was never known to fail his friends in the hour of need, but was ready to aid them with his advice, his influence, and his purse, as many a young scientific man amongst us can testify. Burn at Tarradale, in Ross-shire, he received his early educa- tion as a boy at the Grammar School at Durham. But the associations of his Highland home — his ancient Scot- tish pedigree, numbering in the long roll many a staunch sup- porter of the Stuarts, who had freely laid down their lives for their Sovereign — combined with the stirring events which marked the period of his own youth, no doubt powerfully influenced young Murchison in selecting a profession, until in imagination he too, like lloderick Vich Alpine, heard the mountains say — *' To you as to your sires of yore, Belong the target and ela3'more ! " Having made up his mind to follow the military profession, he was sent by his father, Mr. Kenneth Murchison, to the Royal Military College, Grreat Marlow, after which, having pursued his studies for a few months at the University of Edinburgh, he ob- tained a commission in the army in 1807, and joining his regi- ment the following year, served in the 3Gth Foot with the army in Spain and Portugal under Lord Wellington, afterwards on the Staff" of his uncle, General Sir Alexander Mackenzie, and lastly as Captain in the 6th Dragoons. He took an active part in several of the most important battles in the war, and earned the reputation of being a brave and able officer. He carried the colours of his regiment at the Battle of Vimiera, and afterwards accompanied the army in its advance to Madrid and its junction with the force under Sir John Moore, and shared in the danirers and retreat at Corunna. At the end of the war in 1815, he married Charlotte, only daughter of the late General Francis Hugonin. It was Sir Roderick's own conviction that to his wife's influence was mainly to be attributed the choice he made in follow^ing scientific pursuits with her, and giving up, as he did, the ordinary amusements of a retired cavalry ofl&cer.* She was his friend, companion, and fellow-labourer in geology, aiding him in his observations, and making for him those remarkable geolo- * See notice of Lady Murchison, Geol. Mag., 1869, Vol. VI., p. 227, by Prof. Geikie, F.R.S., President Edinburgh Geological Society. 236 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. gical sketches of landscape that illustrate his works. He is also said to have early become acquainted with Sir Humphry Davy, who su^sested to him that he should attend the lectures of the Royal Institution. This advice he followed, and he also studied with Mr. Richard Phillips, F.R.S. In 1825 he was elected a Fellow of the Geological Society of London, and in the same year he read his first paper on " The Geological Formation of the North-west extremity of Sussex, and the adjoining parts of Hants and Surrey," before that Society .f In 1826 he recorded the results of his investigations in the Oolitic series of Sutherland, Ross, and the Hebrides, and in the same year he was elected to the Fellowship of the Royal Society ; the following year he again visited the Highlands in company with Professor Sedgwick and succeeded in showing that the primary Sandstone of McCulloch was really the true Old Red Sandstone or Devonian. In 1828 he resolved to extend his researches abroad, and to study the extinct volcanos of Auvergne and the geology of the Tvrol. He was accompanied on this occasion by Mr. (now Sir Charles) Lyell. Following Dr. Buckland's advice, Murchison next devoted himself to a careful examination of the geology of Hereford, Shropshire, and the Welsh Borders, the ancient country of the Sihires, and it was upon this investigation that his great Silurian system was afterwards founded. These researches he afterwards followed up by others in Pem- brokeshire, to the west of 3Iilford Haven ; and his conclusions as to the stratigraphical relation between the Devonian and the underlying Silurian systems was made public at the meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science in 1831, but his great work did not appear until 1839. Further geographical investigations in Devon and Cornwall followed, in which Professor Sedgwick took part, and in 1835 and 1839, two journeys were performed by Sedgwick and Mur- chison to the Rhenish Provinces; on the latter occasion M. de Verneuil also accompanied them. The result of these researches, t This paper is of great historical interest, being accompanied by a letter from the illustrious Baron Cuvier, in which he gives a detailed description of the Reptilian remcains forwarded to him by Mr. Mur- chison for examination. The specimens which are figured and des- cribed in this paper are now preserved in the British Museum. No. 2.] MISCELLANEOUS. 237 and comparison of the English Devonians with those of Rhenish Prussia, was pubHshed in 1839, and a final classification adopted. In 1840, accompanied by De Verneuil, Murchison visited Russia, at that period very little known geologically. They examined the banks of the rivers Volkofi" and Siass, and the shores of Lake Onega, thence to Archangel and tlie borders of the White Sea, and followed the river Dvvina in the sovern- nient of Vologda. They traversed the Volga and returned by Moscow to St. Petersburg, examining the Valdai Hills, Lake Ilmen, and the banks of the rivers which they passed. They then returned to England, but having been invited by the late Emperor Nicholas to superintend a Geological Survey of Russia, the two geologists returned to St. Petersburg in the spring of 1841, and being joined by Count Keyserling and Lieutenant Kokscharow, they proceeded to explore the Ural Mountains, the Southern Provinces of the Empire and the Coal Districts between the Dneiper and the Don. In 1842 Murchison travelled alone through several parts of Germany, Poland, and the Carpathian Mountains, the better to understand the relations of the irreat formations to each other over wide areas. In 1844 he explored the Palaeozoic rocks of Sweden and Norway. In 1845-6 he completed his great joint work on " The Geology of Russia and the Ural Mountains,'' in two quarto volumes of TOO and 600 pages, copiously illustrated with maps, sections, and plates of fossils. Not long after the publication of this w^ork, Mr. Murchi- son was knighted by her Majesty, the Emperor having previously conferred several Russian orders on him, including that of St. Stanislaus. In 1849 he received the Copley medal from the Royal Society, in recognition of his having established the Silu- rian system in geology. His researches (extending over six visits) in the Alps, Apen- nines, and Carpathian mountains, established the fact of a gradu- ated transition from Secondary to Tertiary rocks, and clearly separates the great Numniulitic formation from the Cretaceous formations with which it was confounded. Ranking next in importance to his definition of the Silurian System was his difi"erentiation of the Permians. Having satisfied himself that the Lower Red Sandstone, and the Magnesian Lime- stone and Marl Slates constituted one natural group only, whicli, from their organic contents, must be entirely separated from the overlying formations, he proposed, in 1841, that the group should 238 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. receive the name of the "Permian " system, from Perm, a Rus- sian Government, where these strata are more extensively devel- oped than elsewhere, occupying an area twice the size of France, and containinf>' an abundant and varied suite of fossils. The name Permian is now generally adopted. In 1854 Sir Roderick published the first edition of his best- known work, '' Siluria," which had, in 1867, reached its fourth edition, and contains 566 pages 8vo. of closely printed matter, 41 plates and explanations. In 1855 he produced a memoir in conjunction with Prof. Morris on the German Pala30zoic rocks, and shows that there is DO break between the Permian system and the Triassic series. By the death of Sir H. T. dc la Beche, Sir Roderick, in 1855, succeeded to the post of Director General of the Geologi- cal Survey and the Museum of Practical Geology in Jermyn Street, w^hich have owed their efficiency for the past fifteen years very largely to his energy and constant attention. Sir Roderick 3Iurchison will long be remembered both in the world of science and of commerce in connexion with the discovery of gold in Australia. Long years before the actual discovery of gold in Australia was made known, he inferred the presence of auriferous deposits in the Australian mountain- ranges from the analogy which existed between their rock formations and those of the Ural mountains, with the phj^sical characters of which he had made himself familiar. He endeavoured most earnestly at the time to awaken the attention of the Home Government to the great importance of the subject to our colonies in the Southern hemisphere, but with little success. Burins: his scientific career he has been identified most inti- mately with the Geological Society, He acted as Secretary for five years, was elected President in 1831-2, and again in 1842-3. He aided Sir B;!vid Brewster, in 1830, to establish the British Association, of which for several years he acted as General Sec- retary. He was President at the Meeting for 1846, at South- ampton. In 1844 he was elected President of the Royal Geographical Society, and again in 1845, in 1852, and in 1856; indeed, he has held the Presidential chair of that Society almost down to the present time ; having been succeeded only a few months ago by Sir Henry Rawlinson. His energetic efforts in advocatino; the search after Sir John .j^V.VXV, ^.w- ».. ..^ Q No. 2.] MISCELLANEOUS. 239 Franklin; his success. in rait^ing a monument to Lieutenant Bel-. lot, of the French Navy; his advocacy of the explorers of Central Africa, Burton, Speke, Grant, Baker, and especially his friend Livingstone, are among the proofs of his earnest self-devotion to the cause of Geographical research. Amongst the many workers in the fields of science how few there are whose actual published labours extend over half a cen- tury ; yet almost the last Blue Book which has appeared, namely, '" the Report of the Commissioners appointed to inquire into the several matters relating to Coal in the United Kingdom," (Vol. I. General Report and Twenty-two Sub-reports, folio, 1871), bears Sir Roderick's name second on the Commission. The Council of the Geological Society awarded him the Wol- laston Gold Medal, in 1864, in recognition of his contributions to geology as an inductive science. The Universities of Oxford, Cambridre-du-Loup indubitable evidence of a marine Boulder-clay, and this underlies the representative of the Leda clay, and rests immediately on striated rock surfjices — the striae running north-east and south-west. The Cacouna Boulder-clay is a somewhat deep-water deposit. Its most abundant shells are Leda truncata, Nucula tenuis, and Telllna proxima, and these are imbedded in the clay with the valves closed, and in as perfect condition as if the animals still inhabited them. At the time when they lived, the Cacouna ridges must have been reefs in a deep sea. Even Mount Pilote has huge Laurentian boulders high up on its sides, in evidence of this. The shales of the Quebec group were being wasted by the waves and currents ; and while there is evidence that much of the fine mud worn from them was drifted far to the south- west to form the clays of the Canadian plains, other portions were deposited between the ridges, along with boulders dropped from the ice which drifted from the Laurentian shore to the north. The process was slow and quiet ; so much so that in its later stages many of the boulders became encrusted with the cal- careous cells of marine animals before they became buried in the clay. No other explanation can, I believe, be given of this de- posit ; and it presents a clear and convincing illustration, applic- able to wide areas in Eastern America, of the mode of deposit of the Boulder-clay. A similar process, though probably on a much scalier scale, is now going on in the Gulf. Admiral Bayfield has w^ell illustrated the fact that the ice now raises, and drops in new places, multi- ■ tudes of boulders, and I have noticed the frequent occurrence of this at present on the coast of Nova Scotia. At Cacouna itself, there is, on some parts of the shore, a band of large Laurentian boulders between half tide and low-water mark, which are moved * Canadian Naturalist^ April, 18C5, 246 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. more or less by the ice every winter, so that the tracks cleared by the people for launching their boats and building their fishing- wears, are in a few years filled up. Wherever such boulders are dropped on banks of clay in process of accumulation, a species of Boulder-clay, similar to that now seen on the land, must result. At present such materials are deposited under the influence of tidal currents, running alternately in opposite directions; but in the older Boulder-clay period, the current was probably a steady one from the north-east, and comparatively little affected by the tides. The Boulder-clay of Cacouna and Biviere-du-Loup, being at a lower level and nearer the coast than that found higher up the St. Lawrence valley, is probably newer. It may have been de- posited after the beds of Boulder-clay at Montreal had emerged. That it is thus more recent, is farther shown by its shells, which are, on the whole, a more modern assemblage than those of the Leda clay of jMontreal. In fossils, as well as in elevation, these beds mare nearly resemble those on the coast of Maine. It would thus appear that the Boulder-clay is not a continuous sheet or stratum, but that its different portions were formed at different times, during the submergence and elevation of the country ; and it must have been during the latter process that the greater part of the deposits now under consideration were formed. The assemblage of shells at Biviere-du-Loup, is, in almost every particular, that of the modern Gulf of St. Lawrence, more especially on its northern coast. The principal difference is the prevalence of Leda truncata in the lower part of the deposit. This shell, still living in Arctic America, has not yet occurred in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, but is distributed throughout the lower part of the Post-pliocene deposits in the whole of Lower Canada and New England, and appears in great numbers at Biviere-du-Loup, not only in the ordinary form, but in the shortened and depauperated varieties which have been named by Beeve L. sillqua and L. sulcifera. 0^ Astarte Laurentlana, supposed to be extinct, and which occurs so abundantly in the Post-pliocene at Montreal, few speci- mens were found, and its place is supplied by an allied but appa- rently distinct species, to be noticed in the sequel, which is still abundant at Gaspe and Labrador, and on the coast of Nova Scotia. It must be observed that though the clays at Biviere-du-Loup Xo. 3.] DAWSON— POST-PLIOCENE. 247 are more recent than those of Montreal, they are still of consider- able antiquity. They must have been deposited in water perhaps fifty fathoms deep, and the bottom must have been raised from that depth to its present level.; and in the meantime the high cliffs now fronting the coast must have been cut out of the rocks of the Quebec group. The order of succession of beds, as seen in the banks of the Little Tiiviere-du-Loup, may be stated as follows, in descending order : 1. Large Loose Boulders, mostly of Laurcntian rocks, seen in the tops of ridges of rock and gravel. One angular mass of Quebec group conglomerate was observed ninety feet in circumference and ten to fifteen feet hif^-h. Near it was a rounded boulder of Anorthosite Felspar from the Laurcntian, 13 feet long. 2. Stratified sand and 2;ravel restinsr on the sides of the rid2;es of rock projecting through the drift. Thickness variable. 3. Stratified sandy clay and sand with TeUlna Groenlandica and Bwcclnum. 10 feet. 4. Gray clay and stones. Rliijnconella psittacea, and Terehratu- lina Spitzhergensis, &c. 1 foot or more, 5. Gray clay with large stones, often covered with Bryozoa and Acorn-shells. Tclllna caharea very abtmdant, also Leda tnincafa. 3 feet. 6. Tough, hard, reddish clay, with stones and boulders, passing downward into Boulder-clay, and holding Leda tnincafa. 6 feet or more. It was ob.seryablc that the boulders were more abundant on the south side of the ridges than on the north ; and between Riviere-du-Loup and Quebec there are numerous small ridges and projecting masses of rock rising above the clays, which gen- erally show the action of ice on their N. E. sides; while the large boulders lying on the fields are seen to have their longer axesN. E. and S. W. At the Petite Ilivicre-du-Loup the surface of the red clay (No. 6 above) was- observed to have burrows of J/ya arenaria, with the shells (of a deep-water form) still within them. 248 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Yol vi. Yl.—Rlver St. Lawrence above Quebec, and Ottawa Valley. Quebec and its Vicinity. — The deposits at Beauport, near Quebec, were described by Sir C. Lyell in the Geological Trans- actions for 1839; and a list of their fossils was given, and was compared with those of Montreal in my paper of 1859. As exposed at the Beauport Mills, the Post-pliocene beds consist of a thick bed of Boulder-clay, on which rests a thin layer of sand with Rhynconella j^sittacea and other deep-water shells. Over this is a thick bed of stratified sand and gravel filled with Saxi- cava rugosa and TelUna . In a brook near this place, and also in the rising ground behind Point Levi, the deep-water bed attains to greater thickness, but does not assume the aspect of a true Leda clay. Above Quebec, however, the clays assume more importance; and between that place and Montreal are spread over all the low country, often attaining a great thickness, and not unfrequently capped with the Saxicava sand. At Cap a la Pioche the officers of the Geological Survey have found a bed of stratified sand under the Leda clay. The Beauport deposit is evidently somewhat exceptional in its want of Leda clay, and this I suppose may have been owing to the powerful currents of water which have swept around Cape Diamond at the time of the ele- vation of the land out of the Post-pliocene sea. The layer of sand at the surface of the Boulder-clay is evidently here the representative of the Leda clay, and afibrds its characteristic fossils, while the stones projecting above the Boulder-clay are crusted with Bryozoa and Acorn-shells. At St. Nicholas, there is a sandy Boulder-clay, not unlike that of Riviere-du-Loup, which has afi'orded some very interesting fossils. It is stated in the Report of the Survey to be one hundred and eighty feet above the sea. ' Montreal. — la the neighbourhood of Montreal very interesting exposures of the Post-pliocene beds occur, and with the terraces on the Mountain have been described in my papers of 1857 and 1859. I may here merely condense the leading facts, adding those more recently obtained. No. 3.] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 249 An interesting section of the deposits is that obtained at Logan's Farm, which may be thus stated in descending order : ft. in. Soil and sand, 1 9 Tough reddish clay, 0 0 J Gray sand, a few specimens of Saxicava rngosa, Mytihis edulis, Tellina Grocnlandica, and Mya arenaria, the valves generally united, 0 8 Tough reddish clay, a few shells oi Asiarte Laurentiana, and Leda truneata, 1 1 Gray sand, containing detached valves of Saxicava riigosa, Mya truneata, and Tellina Grcenlandica : also Trichotropis bore- aiis, and Balanus crenatus ; the shells, in three thin layers, 0 8 Sand and clay, Avith a few shells, principally Saxicava in de- tached valves 1 3 Band of sandy clay, full of Natlca claiisa, Trichotropis borealis, Fusus tornatus, Buccinun glaciale, Asiarte Laurentiana, Balanus crenatus. «fec.&c., sponges and Foraminifera. Nearly all the rare and deep-sea shells of this locality occur in this band, 0 3 Sand and clay, a few shells of Astarte and Saxicava, and remains of sea-weeds with Lepralia attached ; also Foraminifera,. . . 2 0 Stony clay (Boulder-clay). Depth unknown. In this section the greater part of the thickness corresponds to the Leda chiy, which at this place is thinner and more fossiliferous than usuaL Along the south-east side of the Mountain, and in the city of Montreal, the beds have been exposed in a great num- ber of places, and are in the aggregate at least 100 feet thick, though the thickness is evidently very variable. The succession may be stated as follows : 1. Saxicava Sand. — Fine uniformly grained yellowish and gray silicious sand with occasional beds of gravel in some places, and a few large Laurentian boulders, Saxicava, Mjjtilus, &c., in the lower part. Thickness variable, in some places 10 feet or more. 2. Leda Clay. — Unctuous gray and reddish calcareous clay, which can be observed to be arranged in layers varying slightly in colour and texture. Some of these layers have sandy partings in which are usually Foraminifera and shells or fragments of shells. In the clay itself the only shells usually found are Leda truneata and a smooth deep-water form of Tellina Groenlandica ; but toward the 250 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. surface of the clay in places where it has not been denuded before the deposition of the overlying sand, there are many species of marine shells. A few large boulders are scattered through the Leda clay. 3. Boulder-clay. — Stiff gray stony clay or till, with large boulders and many glaciated stones, often 'of the same Trenton rocks which occur on the flanks of the Mountain. It is of great thickness, though it has been much denuded in places, and has not been observed to contain fossils. It is especially thick at the south and south-west sides of the Montreal Mountain. The Montreal Mountain, like other isolated trappean hills in the great plain of the Lower St. Lawrence, presents a steep craggy front to the north-east, and a long slope or tail to the south-west ; and in front of its north-east side is a bare rocky plateau of great extent, and at a height of rather more than 100 feet above the river. This plateau must have been produced by marine denudation of the solid mass of the Mountain in the Post- pliocene period, and proves an astonishing amount of this kind of erosive action in hard limestones interleaved with trap dykes, and which have been ground and polished with ice at the same time that the plateau was cut into the hill. By ice also must the debris produced by this enormous erosion have been removed, and piled along the more sheltered sides of the hill in the Boulder- clay. With re2:ard to the cra";-and-tail attitude of Montreal Moun- tain, I have to observe that in large masses of this kind reaching to a considerable height, and rising above the Post-pliocene, sea, the north-east or exposed side has been cut into steep cliffs, but in smaller projections of the surface over which the ice could grind, the exposed side is smoothed or '• moutonnee," and the sheltered side is ang-ular. A little reflection must show that this must be the necessary action of a sea burdened with heavy floating ice. The most strongly marked terraces on the Montreal Mountain, are at heights of 4T0, 440, 386, and 220 fact above the sea, but there are less important intermediate terraces. On the highest of these, on the west side of the Mountain, over Cote des Neiges villaofe. there is a beach with marine shells, and on the summit of the Mountain, at a height of about 700 feet, there are rounded No, 3.] DAWSON— POST-PLIOCENE. 251 surfaces, probably polished by ice, though no striation remains, and largo Laurentian boulders, which must have been carried probably a hundred miles from the Laurentian regions to the north-east, and over the dsep intervening valley of the St. Law- rence. I have already, in the first part of this memoir, noticed the striation on rock surfaces at Montreal, and may merely add that it is often very perfect, and must have been produced by a force acting up the St. Lawrence valley from the north-east, and plan- ing all the spurs of the Mountain on that side, while leaving the 3Iountain itself as a bare and rugged unglaciated escarpment, [n the streets of Montreal the true Boulder-clay is often exposed in excavations, and is seen to contain great numbers of glaciated stones, most of which are of the hardened Lower Silurian shales and limestones of the base of the Mountain ; and thouQ;h no marine shells have been found, the sub -aquatic origin of the mass is evidenced by its gray unoxidised character, and by the fact that many of the striated stones at once fall to pieces when ex- posed to the frost, so that they cannot possibly have been glaciated by a sub-aerial glacier. At the Glen brick-work, near Montreal, the Leda clay and underlying deposits have been excavated to a considerable depth, and present certain remarkable modifications. The section ob- served at this place is as follows : ft. in. 1. Hard gray laminated clay, Foraminifera and Leda, in thin layers 7 0 2. Red layer, in two bands 0 6 3. Sandy clay 1 o 4. Gray and reddish clay 9 o 5. Hard buff sand, very fine and laminated 15 0 6. Sand with layers of tough clay, holding glaciated stones, and very irregularly disposed 4 0 7. Fine sand 1 0 8. Gray sand, with rounded pebbles, and laminated ob- scurely and diagonally 4 0 9. Fine laminated yellow sand 3 0 10. Gravel 0 4 11. Very irregular mass of laminated sand, with mud, gravel, stones and large boulders 12 0 56 10 252 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. Vl. The whole of these deposits except the Leda clay, are very irregularly bedded, and are apparently of a littoral character. They seem to shew the action of ice in shallow water before the deposition of the Leda clay. The only way of avoiding this conclusion would be to suppose that the underljdng beds are really of the age of the Saxicava sand, and that the Leda clay has been placed above them by slipping fram a higher terrace ; but I failed to see crood evidence of this. A little farther west at the gravel pits dug in the terrace for railway ballast, a deep section is exposed showing at the top Saxicava sand, and below this a very thick bed of sandy clay with stones and boulders, con- stituting apparently a somewhat arenaceous and partially stratified equivalent of the Boulder-clay. A little above this place, at the Brick-works, the Saxicava sand is seen to rest on a highly fossil- iferous Leda clay, which probably here intervenes between the two beds seen in contact nearer the edge of the terrace. Ottawa River. — The Leda clay and Saxicava sand arc well exposed on the banks of the Ottawa; and Green's Creek, a little below Ottawa City, has become celebrated for the occurrence of hard calcareous nodules in the clay, containing not only the ordinary shells of this deposit, but also well-preserved skeletons of the Capelin (^Mallotus) of the Lump-sucker (Cycloiiterus) and of a species of stickleback (^Gasterosteus). Some of these nodules also contain leaves of land plants and fragments of wood, and a fresh-water shell of the genus Lymnea has also been found. At Packenham Mills west of the Ottawa, the late Sheriff Dickson found several species of laud and fresh-water shells associated with Tellina Groenlandica and apparently in the Saxicava sand. These facts evidence the vicinity of the Laurentian shore, and indicate a climate only a little more rigorous than that of Central Canada at present. They were noticed in some detail in my paper of 1866 in The Canadian N^aturalist.. The marine deposits on the St. Lawrence are limited, as already stated, to the country east of Kingston ; and the clays of the basin of the great lakes to the south-westward have, as yet, afi'orded no marine fossils. I have, however, just learned from Prof. Bell, uf the Geological Survey, a discovery made by him in the past summer and which is of very great interest, namely that two hundred miles north of Lake Superior the marine deposits reappear. The details of this important discovery will be given in a forthcoming Report of the Geological Survey^ ^^0. 3.] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 253 and its theoretical significance will be referred to in tlie conclud- ing part of this memoir. In the above local details, I have given merely the facts of greatest importance, and may refer for many subordinate points to the papers catalogued in the introduction to this memoir, and to the reports of the Geological Survey of Canada. PART III. — REVISION OF POST-PLIOCENE FOSSILS OF CANADA, The list of Post-pliocene fossils published previously to 1856, amounted to only about 26 species. In my papers published between that year and 1863, the number was raised to nearly 80. My lists were tabulated, along with some additional species fur- nished in MS, in the Report of the Geological Survey for 1863, the list there given amounting to 83 species, exclusive of Fora- minifera. In my paper on the Post-pliocene of Riviere-du-Loup and Tadoussac, published in 1865, I added 38 species, and shall be able still farther to increase the number in the present revision, which will afi"ord a very complete view of the subject up to the present time ; and though additional species will no doubt be found, yet all the. principal deposits have been so carefully ex- plored that only very rare species can have escaped observation. For some of the additional species included in the present list, I am indebted to Mr. G. T. Kennedy of Montreal, Dr. Anderson of Quebec, and other friends, to whom reference will be made in connection with the several species in the catalogue. SUB-KINGDOM RADIATA. Class I. — Protozoa. (1) Foraminifcra, Nodosarla {Glandallna) Jcevigata. (Var. Dentalina communis) Fossil — Leda clay, Montreal. Recent— Gulf St. Lawrence, 30 to 300 fathoms, G.M.D.^'^' This species is very rare in the Post-pliocene, but sometimes of large size and of different varietal forms. * The initials G. M, D., refer to the List of Foraminifera by Mr. G. M. Dawsou in The Canadian Naturalist, 1870. 254 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vl. Lagena Sulcata - — -- (Yar. distoma.) • — — — - — = (Yar. semisidcata.') Fossil — Leda clay, Montreal ; Quebec ; Murray Bay; Riviere- du-Loup ; Portland (Maine.) Recent — Gulf St. Lawrence, 18 to 313 fathoms, Gr.M.D. Rather rare in the Post-pliocene as well as in the recent. Entosolenia glohosa. — — costata. margin ata. — — ——squamosa. Fossil — Montreal, Leda clay ; Labrador ; Riviere-du-Loup ; Murray Bay; Quebec; Portland (Maine). Recent — Gulf and River St. Lawrence, 20 to 313 fathoms. G. M. D. Generally diffused in the Post-pliocene, and presenting the same range of forms as in the recent ; but not common. I regard the supposed species of Entosolenia above named as merely varietal forms. Bullm'uia Presli. — — — (Yar. squamosa) Fossil — Montreal, Leda clay ; Labrador ; Riviere-du-Loup ; Murray Bay; Quebec; Portland (Maine). Recent — Gulf and River St. Lawrence, 10 to 313 fathoms, G. M. D. Generally diffused in the Post- pliocene. In the recent it seems to be a deep-water form. What Parker and Jones call the essen- tially arctic form B. eleganfissima is not uncommon, though other forms also occur. Poli/morj)liina laciea. Fossil — Montreal, Leda clay ; Labrador ; Riviere-du-Loup ; Murray Bay. Recent — Gulf and River St. Lawrence, 30 to 313 fathoms. G. M. D. Not uncommon in the Post pliocene, particularly in the deeper parts of the Leda clay. Less common recent. I observed in the Riviere-du-Loup gatherings a small individual of this species with the internal pipe at the aperture characteristic of Entosolenia, which is also sometimes observed in recent specimens. No. 3.] DAWSON — I'OST-PLIOCENE. 255 Truncafulina lohulata. Fossil — Lcda clay, Labrador ; Pviviere-du-Loup. Recent — Gulf St. LuT^'rence, very common 30 to 50 futlioms. This species is much less common in the Post-pliocene than in the recent. Orhidlna unicersa. Fossil — Leda clay, Montreal ; Riviere-du-Loup ; Labrador. This may be regarded as a rare and somewhat doubtful Post- pliocene fossil. It has not yet been recognized in the Gulf of St, Lawrence. Glohigerina huUoides. Fossil — Riviere-du-Loup. Recent — Gulf St. Lawrence, more especially in the deeper water, where it is common. It is very rare in the Post-pliocene. Palvinulina repanda. Fossil — Montreal, Leda clay ; Riviere-du-Loup ; Murray Bay ; Labrador; Quebec; Portland (Maine). Recent — Gulf St. Lawrence, 30 to 313 fathoms, G. M. D. Somewhat rare both in the Post-pliocene and recent, and^ of the small size usual in the arctic seas. Folystomella a'lsjxi. — (Yar. Striatojmncfafa) . (Yar. Arcfica.) Fossil — Montreal, Leda clay; Labrador; Riviere-du-Loup; Murray Bay; Quebec; Portland (Maine); St. John, N. B. Recent — Gulf and River St. Lawrence, 30 to 40 fathoms. G. M. D. Yery common, especially in depths of 10 to 40 fathoms. This is by far the most abundant species in the Post-pliocene deposits, as it is also in all the shallow parts of the Gulf of St. Lawrence at present, and also in the Arctic Seas, according to Parker and Jones. It is the only species yet found in the Boulder-clay of Montreal, and this very rarely. Xon ion ina scaplia . (Yar. Lalradorica.') Fossil — Leda clay, Montreal; Riviere-du-Loup; Labrador: Murray Bay; Quebec; St. John, N, B. 256 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. Recent — Gulf and River St. Lawrence, 10 to 313 fathoms. Var. Lahradorica is the deeper water form and is rare in the Leda clay. Textularia pi/gmcea. Fossil — Leda clay, Labrador ; Riviere-du-Loup ; Quebec : also at Portland (Maine). Recent— Gulf St. Lawrence, 10 to 30 fathoms. The Textulariae are rare and of small size, both in the Post- pliocene and recent. Coimiisjnra foltacea. Fossil — Leda clay, Montreal. Recent — Gulf St. Lawrence, 16 to 250 fathoms, G. M. D. This species is rare both fossil and recent. Qain q uelocuUna semimdum. Fossil — Leda clay, Montreal; Labrador; Quebec; Portland (Maine). Recent — Gulf St. Lawrence, 10 to 313 fathoms, most abun- dant in shallow water. G. M. D. This species is by no means common and not usually large in the Post-pliocene. It is more abundant in the clays of Maine than in those of Canada. Biloculina ringens. Fossil — Leda clay, Montreal ; Labrador ; Riviere-du-Loup ; Murray Bay ; Quebec. Recent— Gulf St. Lawrence, 30 to 213 fathoms. G. M. D. Rather rare in the Post-pliocene as well as in the recent. Triloculina tricarinata. Fossil — Leda clay, Riviere-du-Loup ; Murray Bay ; Quebec. Recent — Gaspe, 30 to 50 fathoms. G. M. D. Rare both in Post-pliocene and recent, but perhaps more gen- erally diffused in the former. Lituola and Saccammina. A very few minute sandy forms referable to these genera are found among the finer part of the washings from Riviere-du-Loup. Euglyplia ? A single minute test, apparently identical in form with that of Eiiglypha alveolata, was found in washing the Rivi^re-du-Loup clays. No. 3.] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 257 In general terms it may be stated that all the species of For- aminiiera found in the Post-plloccne stiil inhabit the Gulf and River St. Lawrence. Several species found in the Gulf of St. Lawrence have not yet been recognized in the Post-pliocene, and these arc mostly inhabitants of depths exceeding 90 fathoms, or among the more southern forms found in the Gulf. On the whole, the assemblage, as in the northern part of the Gulf of St. Lawrence at present, is essentially arctic, and not indicative of very great depths. The sandy forms which are not uncommon in the Gulf are very rare in the Post-pliocsne ; but this may be accounted for by the greater difficulty of washing them out of the clay, or possibly their cementing material may have decomposed, allowing them to fall to pieces. As the epidermal matter of shells is often pre- served, the last supposition seems less likely. The Leda clays are, however usually very fine and calcareous, so that there was probably more material for calcareous than for arenaceous forms. The Foraminifera are very generally diffused in the Postplio- cenc clays, though much more abundant in some layers than in others. They may easily be detected by a pocket lens, and are usually in as fine preservation as recent specimens, especially in the deeper and more tenacious layers of the Leda clay. They are however, usually most abundant in the somewhat arenaceous layers near the top of the Leda clay, and immediately below the Saxicava sand, and especially where this layer contains abund- ance of shells of ^lollusca. I have nowhere found them more abundant or in greater variety than at the Glen Brick-work, Montreal, on the McGIll College Grounds, and at Logan's Farm. At the Glen Brick-work a few worn specimens of Poly^ stomella are contained in the beds underlying the Leda clay and equivalent to the Boulder-clay, which, however, has in general, in the vicinity of Montreal as yet aff"orded no marine fossils. In searching for Foraminifera in the clays of Rivicrc-du-Loup, I have observed in the finer washings several species of Diato- mvccoe ; among these a species of Coscinodiscus very frequent in the deeper parts of the Gulf of St. Law^-ence. But on the whole Diatoms appear to be rare in these deposits. In the Rivicre-du- Loup clays I have also observed the pollen grains of firs and spruces. The nomenclature used above is that of Parker and Jones, in their paper on the North Atlantic Soundings, in the Transactions Vol VI, X No. 3. 258 THE CANADIAN NATURLIST. [Vol. vi. of the Royal Society. For figures of the species, I inny refer to that memoir, and to my previous papers published in the Natur- alist. (2) Fori/era. Tefhea Logan i\ Dawson. Leda clay, Montreal. This species has not yet been recognised in a living state, though allied to Tctliaa /u's/^/c/a, Bowerbank, of the coast of Maine. Its spicules in considerable masses, look- ing like white fibres, are not uncommon in the Post-plioc3ne at Montreal. Tethea ? Another sillcious sponge is indicated by little groups of small spicules found at the Tanneries, near Montreal, by Mr. G. T. Kennedy, and at Riviere-du-Loup by the author. Its spicules nre long and aceratc, and much more slender than those of Tethea Lognni. They resemble those of T. hlsplda, recent on the coast of Maine, and also those of a species of Polymastia, dredged by Mr. AVhiteaves in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. Class 11.™ Anthozoa. Class III. — Hydrozoa. No distinct organisms referable to the above groups have yet been found in the Post-pliocene deposits of Canada. As our recent fauna includes no stony coral, and the recent species of the Gulf of St. Lawrence have no parts likely to be preserved other than minute spicules, this is not to be wondered at. In washino; the clavs for Foraminifera, however, numerous fra2;ments are obtained, which resemble portions of the horny skeletons of hydroids, though not in a state admitting of determination. Class IV.— Eciiinodermata. (1) Ojohiurldea. Ojpliioghjplia Sarsil, Lulken. Fossil — Loda cl;iy, neir St. John, N. Brunswick ; Mr. Matthew. Recent— River St. Liwrcnc3, at Murray B.iy; also found of l:irge size in deep water in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, by Mr. Whitcaves. No. 3.] MACFARLANE — ON CRYSTALLINE ROCKS. 259 Opluocoma. FiMgments of a small species of ophiuroid starfish not deter- minable, have beea found in the Leda clay at Montreal, and in nodules at Green's creek. (2) Ecliinoidea. Earyecliinus drohachlensis, Miiller. Fossil — Leda clay, Beauport ; E-iviere-du-Loup ; Montreal. This species is rare in the Post -pliocene, but very conimou in all parts of the Gulf of St. Lawrence at present. (3) Hohtliuridea, Psolus phantopus '? Oken. Scales of an animal of this kind have been found in the Leda clay at Montreil. They may beloni; to P. phanfopus, or to the spscies P. (^Lopliothuria') Fabricii, also found on our coasts. ON THE ORIGIN AND CLASSIFICATION OF ORIGINAL OR CRYSTALLINE ROCKS. By Thomas Macfarlake. (^Continued from page 312 — Vol. V.) V. — MINERALOGICAL CONSTITUTION. Having*, in the forcgoinir, adverted to the texture and cheniicul composition of original rocks, it now becomes necessary to refer more particularly to their mineralogical constitution. In order to continue the analogy which has been shewn to exist between fur- nace sla2:s and oriuinal rocks, it will b3 well here to refer to those instances which have boen observed of the formation of well developed crystals in the cooling of artificial silicates. The rapid manner in which furnace slags are commonly allowed to cool is of course detrimental to the formation of any mineral-like aggrega- tions, but it is sometinijs possible to observe in copper furnace slags that, w^hen they have bi3n allowed to solidify in large blocks or cakes, they shew an actynolitic structure in their mass, often closely resemble hornblende rock, and very commonly contain cavities lined with the most beautiful crystals. The formation of pyroxene in slags from iron furnaces has been frequently observed 260 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. Yi. and well authenticated. Noprpjerath described augite crystals from the slags of the iron furnace of Olsberg near Biggein Westphalia. Montefiori Levi analysed augites taken from the slags of the iron furnace at Ausjree near Lieiire. Richter described and examined similar crystals from the iron works of Rufskberg in the Banat ; Von Leonhard mentions acicular augite crystals in the iron fur- nace slags of Skis-hytta in Sweden. F. Sandberger describes similar occurences ; and numerous others might here be mentioned. Mitscherlich and Berthier obtained by melting silica, lime, and magnesia together, in a charcoal crucible placed in a porcelain furnace, a mass possessing cleavage corresponding to the faces of augite, and the hollow cavities in which were crowded with the most beautiful crystals of that mineral. These are also of very common occurrence in th: lava streams not only of extinct but of active volcanoes ; and well-developed augite crystals have not un- frequently been ejected from their craters. Olivine has been observed in the slags of iron furnaces quite as frequently as augite, and it, as w^U as magnetite, is one of the commonest minerals in streams of basaltic lava. So is leucite, although it has not yet been produced artificially. Mitscherlich observed transparent six-sided tabular crystals of mica, and leaves of it several inches broad, in the cavities of old copper furnace slags near Garpeiiberg in Dale- carlia. Gurlt also mentions artificially formed mica, and it ap- pears frequently in ancient and modern lava streams. With regard to felspar, Hausmann makes mention as early as 1810, of felspar crystals which had been formed in one of the Mansfield furnaces. In 183J: Heme found similar crystals in the copper furnace of Sangershausen after it had been blown out, and in the iron furnace of Josephshiitte in the Hartz, they were also detected. In 1810 the formation of felspar crystals in glass works was first observed; and in 1848 Prechtl gave an account of their occurring in a mass of c;lass wci^hin"; 133i- lbs. which had been melted in the plate glass factory at Neuhaus. They were of various sizes, some an inch in length, with perfectly sharp edges. The formation of sanidine and other varieties of felspar, in lavas of recent a2:e, is a matter of common occurrence. No instance is known of the production of quartz from artificial silicates, nor do those lavas of the present day which are highly siliceous, develope it in cooling. These solidify as vitreous uncrystalline masses, but many lavas of extinct volcanoes in the Andes and the Siebcnge- birge contain it in well-formed crystal:*, shewing that it musthavo crystallized out from the mass of the rock. No. 3.] MACFARLANE — ON" CRYSTALLINE ROCKS. 261 The number of minerals which enter into the constitution of rocks is very sm:ill compared with the number of the mineral spe- cies which are found described in the various treatises on minera- logy. Of the latter there are upwards of six hundred, but the great majority of these are rare minerals, occurring in veins or cavities, and not entering: into the constitution of the rocks them- selves. Tiie number of minerals which are found in original rocks is still more limited, and if from it if we deduct the sparin^ily occurring, or so-c.iUed accessorial constituents, the number is reduced to twenty minerals, which may be c:illed the essential constituents of original rocks. The following table gives their names and the silica contents of the extreme acid and basic varieties. Mineral. Pccentaje of Silica. Quartz 100 Orthoclase C9 —62.75 Oligoclase 64 25— 50.28 Labradorite 55.63—50 31 Anoithite 47.63—42.01 Lcucite 58.10—53 50 Nepheline 45.31 — 43.50 Potash mica 51.73 — 43 47 Magnesia mica 44.63 — 36.17 Hornblundu' 60.60—37.84 Pyroxene 57.40—38.58 Hypcrsthene 51.35 Enstatite 56.91 Diallage 53.71—40 12 Olivine 44.67—36.30 Magnetite 00.00 The sep:iration of the minerals occurring in rocks into essential and acces.sovial constituents originated with German litholo2;ists and may perhaps be regarded as arbitrary. In characterising the sixteen minerals just mentioned as essential constituents, we have however, to some extent, been guided by their chemical constitu- tion. In the preceding chapter silicic acid, alumina, peroxide of iron, protoxide of iron, magnesia, lime, soda and potash were indicated as the essential chemical constituents of rocks; and only sucli minerals as contain these substances, and no others, as esseii- tlal ingredients, have been admitted into the table. This mode of selection may perhaps be considered as arbitrary as any other, for it causes the exclusion of the mineral tourmaline, which some- times appears to deserve the rank of au essential constituent. 262 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. Tourmaline, however, contains, besides some of the subtances just mi^ntioned, boraoio acid and fluorine, and, in its mode of occurrence, resembles such accessorial or accidental minerals as zircon, apatite^ titanite and others. Gurnet, corundum, epidote, cordierite and. scapolite are rock minerals, containing no other chemical consti- tuents than those above mentioned, but they have been excluded from our list because they resemble the accessorial constituents m the manner of their occurrence. With reij-ard to these essential minerals it is first to be remarked that the analyses which have been made of them are not, in every case, of such specimens as have actually formed pirt and portion of some rock species. To obtain pure specimens of the minerals of rocks is often a matter of {i'reat difficulty, and well- developed crystals from veins or geodcs have been preferred fox* analysis to the generally amorphous particles of the same species which enter into the constitution of rocks. The composition of these minerals cannot, like that of well-crystallised artificial che* mic.d compounds, be unequivocally expressed by chemical formulae. Attempts, the most painstaking and persevering, have been made in this direction by mineralogists, and the result has only been to shew that, in the majority of cases, each analysis of the same species demands a difijrent formula for expressing its composition in chemical equivalents. The composition of micas, augites and hornblendes is especially variable, and even with regard to the felspars it has been maintained that those of our list are not dis- tinct or independent species but are mixtures of one with the other or with other supposed species.sueh as krablite,albite oradularia. It has thererore been considered best here to neglect their various assumed chemical formula and to regard principally their average chemical composition. Certain difi"erences in the composition of these minerals cause their subdivision into two different classes. The minerals of the first class are mostly silicates of alumina, lime, potash and soda, and it maij he called thefelsjmthic class. It includes, however, leucito and ncphcline, which can scarcely be called felspars, and quartz, which, although of very different composition, nevertheless possesses lithological affinities connecting it closely with the acid felspars. The minerals of the second class also contain lime, but alumina and the alkalies are less frequent or absent altogether, being replaced by magnesia and protoxide of iron. They are generally of a more basic nature than the felspathic class, and the No. 3.] MACFARLANE — OX CRYSTALLINE ROCKS. 263 purely his'ic mineral mignctitc nny bs pl;iC3cl, as lithologically rel.itcd, nlonp; with them. The minerals of this class may there- fore b3 c illeJ the b isic essential constituents of rock^^. Wc have thus the following classification of these essential rock minerals. Glass 1st.— Fclspathic — Quartz, Orthoclas:, Oligoclase, Labra- dorite, Anorthite, Leucite, Nepheline. Class 2nd. — Basic — Potisli mica, Mao-nesia mic:i. Hornblende, Pyroxene, Diallage, Lnstatitc, llyiDcrsthcne, Olivine. Mag- netite. The extent to which thesD minerals enter into the constitution of ori.;,inal rocks will ba b^st seen by repeating- here the general view given of the families of rocks, placing at the head of each column the names of the principal constituents. Table II. General View of the Mineralogical Constitution of the families of Oriiiinal Rocks. Drrsic Rc'rs. B(tx'ui RicIh Ncnt-alRnchs SlHce-ms JVIcs iSilvic Rncka. Folspatbic Min'ls Anorthito Kcpheliiio • . . Oligcclase. Labradoritc. Anorthitc. Nephelno. Orthoclarc. Oligcclase. Quartz Orthcelaso Oligoclato. Quartz. Orthoclaso. Basic Minora Is . . Pyroxene .... Olivine Mignetito . . . M:ig: rai'^a. Hornblende. Pyroxene. Olivine. M'.g: m'oa. Hoinbkndc. Mag: mica. Pot: mica. I. Coarso and small-grained . II. Schistoso III. Slatv Anorthosito.. Basic schist.. Grecn.=tono. Green.^tono schist. Greenstone slate. Greenstone porphry. Variolitc. Trap. Dolerite. Uolcritic lava Syenite. Sycnitic schi^t. Clay slate. Mclaphyre. Vnr.basaUite Basult'.fc. Andesito. Andcsitie. Grnnitito. Gne;£s. Sili-"'eous slate. Porphyrito. Granite. Gneissitc. >ili'^itT Plat.*?. IV. Porphyritic. V, Vnriolitic .... Augit'c por- phry. Porphyry. Sphcrulytc. Fclsitc. Rhyolitc. Obsidian. VI. Fine grain-jd VII. Tny^hytic. YILL Volcauic. Anhydrous i bis lit. Nephelinito. Nephcliuitc lava. EuritJ. Trachyte. Traohytie lava. 264 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Yol. Vl. It will he observed from this table that a certain degree of consistency is observed by the essential minerals in entering into the constitution of original rocks. Such acid minerals as quartz and orthocl.ise never occur in the basic rocks ; nor, on the other hand, do we find augite or labradorite entering into the composi- tion of siliceousgranites or trachytes. Towards the basic extreme of chemical composition in rocks, the siliceous minerals diminish or disappear, and, towards the acid extreme, basic minerals act in the same way. This behaviour alone is sufficient to bhew that the mineralogic.il constitution of a rock is not the result of accident, but mainly the consequence of the chemical nature of the plastic m igna from which it resulted, an inference which is borne out by the varying composition of the minerals themselves. It will be seen that at the heads of the columns the minerals have been arranged according to the classification already given. Now it would appear, with regard to the members of each of the classes which we have dii^tinguished, that not only do they resemble each other in chemical composition but they seem to replace each other when they enter into the composition of origi- nal rocks. That is to say, the increase, in quantity, of one of them in a rock is generally accompanied by a decrease on the part of another member of the class, and generally of that miCmber which most closely approaches the first in chemical composition. This appears to be well borne out by the table, and numerous examples of such substitutions might be cited. Thus hornblende replaces mica in granitite forming syenite ; oligcclase replaces orthoclase in the passage from syenite to diorite ; and diallage replaces pyrox- ene in that species of greenstone called gabbro. There are thus formed gradual transitions from one rock species to another in mineralogical constitution as well as chemical composition. In the subjoined table (III) the nature and manner of these tran- sitions arc exhibited. It will be seen that the distinctions already made as to the orders and families of rocks are kept steadily in view while at the same time an attempt is made to give a systematic arrangement of the diflferent species of original rocks and their mutual relations. No. 3.] MACFARLANE — ON CRYSTALLINE ROCIW. 265 CJ o c o O 'o c c c/: c O a c O fcc o o o •e* •^ . "^ • '" ^-1; ■~ 1- u ?"?^ • i3 1 s A 3 ** O" 'J. 1 oe •^ 5 < • ^3 )-M "^ ZZ ■*-' t/^- l"^ CO * w ^; c^ ^ ^2 a- c: -.a ^ o ^J ■*■ • X tc 5-.M "^ ''■^ S uUIJ V" ©•CO ijsr t CO 1 > fc«- • « o a^ re is o Is s .^ •Z, to i ^ •-"I CO 1 • 00 1 ■^-r -J • 1 c , o c. t* o-r" •»< » tc to s 3^ IC ^-3 O U4 S ^ 3 ,*K t£0 :S '^ .— ^ ►«5 OJ i . .* >i: . o B. •-a ^ .; o ^ ^T .- ^ c > ••* ? ■Z.-^ 2 00 ^ w — — i^ SCO 0-:5 o ■2^ o -1-9 *.2 . o _•■$ c-5 o ^ ? ?> »-■ 1-^ y-^ »^ --J -*< hr IS '-^ --»> ^t •— ( C?S • ^ ::? • • c ~ o fi n »— * c 2 .40 ■<^«j >> ^ !>» o a p. >«-> (-■ en 'Bt fcS CO o tn o CO O o C/2 o >. a s to - ri VI CO "o C 1.^ to CO b o ,-1 M- *— -5 ^ ^ u.^ xn O ri H<5 CO I- • »-* CO a o >. CO o ■fcD fl ?i o IS -.: ra ? =^^ O -r. JJ.4J o -""^c/: CO co^ o . -^ so c s <<1 o '■.5 E 3 gg Co C rj i. ^ «^.- -HO (O t.^T' r: ,• ,i r! CI.?.:- a c a O fcO c = « ;5 r- C^ =^ rt C £- (o £2 cJ o -^ -' O 2 ^J T'x w- C) W >-5"~-^ 3-r, c CO tt CO c 2o CO CO a ^O Cf. S C •.-■ ^ -1 OS .2 -' C. — C ".* .^j ^ 2^3 o o ^-'._r^ O - -i2 ^._ rr -tJ 2;.^ >>..... V. ■■■^ ^_j j_3 fc.^ ""^ ^ ? ^ - - .1—1" o CO ^ H2 = c ti.T( ?;«»;=?; rt c - c K Si c '^ c 'J ^2 ■ice ^()Q THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vl. In preparing tabic III, tlic snmo cnrc has been taken as with those already given to introduc3 no new terms, and to use the "arious n;ini2s of the species only in the sense which at present is generally attached to them by petrologists. In a few instances, where such n.imos have hitherto borne a too general or a more or less indefinite meaning:, an attempt has been made to confine their applic ition to one species. The name rhyolite is for instance used in a somewhat more restricted sense than that given it by its originator, and the very vague, generally condemned, but still much used or misused, name, melaphyrc, is, as applied to a parti- cular species, limited to those porphyrite rocks which are neutral in chcmicil composition and in which crystals of triclinic felspars only are developed. In some other cases, where the same species possessed several synonyms, a slightly different signification has been given to one, and generally the least used of them, in order to make it of use in our .system. For instance, curite and felsite have hitherto been synonymous. In our table the latter term is made to indie itc the more silicic species of fine grained rocks. Such names of rocks as have been derived from those of minerals have their terminations, in accordance with Dana's sucrirestion, altered from ife to tjte. It will be observed that, in table III, the minerals of the fels- pathic class only are placed at the head of the vertical columns, while the other essential minerals have been placed under each variety of texture on the left hand side. The cause of this arrangement may here be stated. The felspars, being of very constant occurrence in original rocks, and being frequently diffi- cult to determine, have not been much made use of in distin- guishing species until quite recently. For instance, oligoclase very often can only be distinguished from orthoclase by an experienced mineralogist, and only an experienced chemist after a minute analysis, can distinguish between oligoclase, labradorite and anorthite in a compound rock. On the other hand the minerals of the other class possess very well marked physical characters, and the presence of one or other of them was readily detected by the earlier petrologists and made use of by them for characterising different rocks. Thus, mica, hornblende and olivine are very widely apart both as regards form, colour, hardness and fusibility. The only two minerals of the second and third classes which are difficult to distinguish from each other are hornblende and augite, and this is only the No. 3.] MACFARLANE— ON CRYSTALLINE ROCKS. 267 case in fine grained compound rocks. By giving prominence to each of these non-felsputhic minerals and placing their nr.mes on the horizontal lines of our table, it becomes possible to shew at a ghmce the rocks which they form with the felspathic minerals named at the heads of the vertical columns, and the manner in which, by gradually replacing each other, they form the different species of original rocks. Thus it will be observed that among the schistose rocks the most basic is diabase schist ; that the latter becomes diorite schist when hornblende replaces pyroxene ; that the diorite schist, as its oligoclase is replaced by orthoclase. becomes syenite schist, and, as quartz makes its appearcnce f.nd increases, syenitic gneiss is produced. At the next step in a silicic direction, mic i replaces the hornblende, producing common gneiss, then when the mica disappears, granulite results. If, instead of the mic-i, the orthoclase disappears, mica schist is developed, and when from the latter rock the mica in greater part is withdrawn, it becomes quartz schist. The other varieties of texture, such as the porphyritic and trachytic, each exhibit a similar series of transitions, the most fully developed being the grunular order. In the latter it becomes possible, by meansof the peculiar arrange- ment of our table, to shew the mineralogical nature of each of the species of the complicated family of the greenstones. Diorite, gabbro, hyperyte, diabase and protobastyte rock are shewn to be respectively characterised by hornblende, diallage, hypersthene, pyroxene and enstatitc in combination with various felspars. The great majority of original rocks contain some variety of felspar, but there are a few species in which that mineral is absent and which are called non-felspathic rocks. In order as far as possible to shew these also in our table, two columns have been added to it, one at each side. The right hand one shews the silicic, and the left hand the basic rocks void of felspar. VI. — ACCESSORIAL CONSTITUENTS. Besides the minerals mentioned in the foregoing chapter as the essential constituents of crystalline rocks, there are others of less frequent and only accidental occurrence, which have been called by German lithologists the accessorial constituents. Among these such minerals are not included as are only found in the veins, cavities, or even joints enclosed in rocks. Only those which are found in intimate mechanical union with the essential constituents in the body of the rock itself are regarded as accessorial consti- 248 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. .tuents. They are sometimes made up of tlio same common chemical components as the essential rock constituents, but much more frequently other r.nd rarer elements enter into their compo= sition. It is indeed almost exclusively from these accessorial minerals that many of the rare simple elements have been derived with which chemists alone have any intimate acquaintance. Thus glucinum, cerium, yttrium, lanthanium, columbium, tantalum, tun^^sten a.nd zirconium are only found as components of accessorial rock constituents, while o'.her elements, such as sulphur, phcspiio- ru5, boron, fluorine, chlorine, tin, copper, lead, chromium and titanium are frequently found in thorn, which but rarely occur in • csscnlial rock constituents. The following' is a catidojiue of the accessorial constituents of rocks, arrannts. These accessorial minerals become less fre- qut^nt in the porphyritic and trachytic rocks, until among modern hvas very few of them are to b3 found. 270 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. The following statement shews the distribution of the accessor- ial minerals among the various orders of original rocks : In coarse and small-jrained rocks. Acgirite. Acschinite. Acmitc. Allanite. Analcim^. Andalusite. Apatite. Apophyllite. Beryll. Blende. Calcspar. Catapleiite. Columbite. Copper pyrites. Cordierite. Corundum. Crocidolit?. ChrysobcrylL Cyanite. Diamond. Epidote. Eudnophite. ' Eukolite. Fluocerite. Fluoiite. Gadolinite. Gahnite. Giil.na. Gold. Graphite. Hematite. Hypostilbitc. Ilmenite. Iron pyrites. Lepidolite. Leucophanc. MagUL^tic pyrites. Mongite. Mercury. Molybdenite. Monazitc. MosHudrite. Phcnakite, Piuiteo Polycrase. Polymignite. Prehnite. Pyrochlore. Paitilc. Saponitc. Saussurite. Scapolite. Silver, Sodalitc. Spoduraene, Tantalite. Thorite. Tinstone. Titanite. Tourmaline, . Triphylite. Tritonite. Vesuvianite. Wolframite. Wohlerite. Yttrotantalite, Zircon. Ifi Schistose rocks, Andalusite. Apatite. Bcryll. Calcspar. Cordierite. Corundum, Cyanite. Dolomite. Fluorite. Graphite. Hematite. Iron j)yrits5. Lepidolite. Molybdenite. K utile. Spinelle. Staurolite. Titanite. Tourmaline. Zircon. No. 3.] MACFARLANE— ON CRYSTALLIKE ROCKS. 271 In Slaty Rocks. Chiastolitc. Chloritoid. Damoiuitc. Dipyre. Falihinitc. Ottrclite. Para2:onitc. Sericitc. Staurolitc. In Porphyritic rocks. Apatite. Calcspar. Crocidolitc. Delcssitc. Epidotc. Flnorite. Gieseckitc Halloysitc. Iron pyrites. Liebenerite. Titanite. Tourmaline. In Impalpalle rocks. Hauyuite. llmenite. Iron. Iron pyrites. Mngnetic pyrites. Nc'pheline. Noscan. Sapphire. Titanite. Zircon. In Trachytic rocki. Apatito. Faujasite. Haiiynits. H',niatite. Iron pyrites. L'jiicite. Mtjlilite. Nepheline. Nosean. Sapphire. Titanite. Zircon. With regard to the origin of these accessorial minerals it may be muintained that by far the greater number of those just men- tioned have been developed during the solidification of the rocks containing; them, and somewhat in advance of the essential con- stituents among which they are found. The evidence of this statement will, howeverj be given in the following chapter. VIL — ON THE ORDER IN WHICH THE CONSTITUENTS OP ORIGINAL ROCKS WERE DEVELOPED. It cannot be assumed that, in the slow crystallisation of a rock from igneous fusion, its minerals were all developed at one and the s;ime instant. On the contrary, many of them are found under circumstinces which prove that, even after their formation, the mother magna still possessed some degree of plasticity, and m my of the constituents of rocks are so associated and surrounded as fairly to lead to the conclusion that a certain order was main- tained in their gradu:il devclopement. The well-known phenomena of fractured crystals iu original .272 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. . [Vol. Vl. rocks first dessrves mention in this connection. Felspar crystals are frequently found in granites, broken in two pieces, these frag- ments baing displaced, and the space between them filled up with granitic sub;stanc3. This is the case with the orthoclase crystals of the porphyry of Elba and of the quartz poryhyry of Ihnenan ; with the sanidine in the trachyte of Drachenfcls, and with the tourmaline of the granite of Winkelsdorf in Moravia. These phenomena serve to prove that the solidification of original rocks took place very gradually, and that their crystallisation was in progress long before they became completely consolidated. Very many of the facts recorded regarding the occurrence of accessorial minerals in rocks go to prove that they w^ere the first to separate from the fluid magma and assume their characteristic forms. Blum has observed that the long tourmaline crystals which occur in the chloritic schists and granites of Aschoffen- burg and of Winkelsdorf in Moravia, and which are frequently found fractured, have their S3parated fragments frequently bent out of their proper direction and cemented together by mica. The proof here seems plain as to the formation of the tourmaline prior to that of the mica.^ In the large grained granite of Berg- stiege, near Ruhla in Thuringia, Senft has observed that the quartz partly surrounds the tourmaline and wholly surrounds the mica plates, and regards this occurrence as proving that the formation both of the tourmaline and of the mica preceded that of the quartz. f Very many instances have been observed which go to prove the formation of tourmaline prior to quartz, and not a few from which it may reasonably be inferred that it crystallised before both mica and felspar. In con- nection with the ore deposits of Scandinavia, mention is made of the occurrence of iron pyrites completely enclosed in a crystal of tourmaline. A similar relation has been observed in the case of garnet, w^hich very frequently encloses in its crystals a kernel of mao-netite. Garnet is, however, noted for enclosing: many other minerals, quartz, mica, iron glance, vesuvian, epi- dote, copper pyrites, iron pyrites, galena, blende, and especially hornblende varieties, having been found in the interior of its crystals. According to Blum the orthoclase crystals of the porphyrite of the Baranco des las Angustias, on the Island of • Ziikel, Pctrographic; I, es. t Die Krystaliinisclie Fclsgeracntheile, p. 512, No. 3.] MACFARLANE — ON CRYSTALLINE ROCKS. 273 Palma, contain radiating particles of epidote which gradually mero-e into the mass of the orthoclase. This and similar instances can scarcely be explained otherwise than on the supposition that the formation of the epidote preceded that of the orthoclase. Other facts concerning the occurrence of epidote in syenitic rocks would seem to indicate that the formation of the hornblende pre- • ceded or took place contemporaneously with that of the epidote. Senft has observed, near Brotterode, staurolite crystals enclosed in transparent plates of mica, and Gr. Rose describes both stau- rolite and cyanite columns as occurring in a similar manner. According to Senft, tourmaline, garnet, staurolite and cyanite are very constant companions of potash mica in crystalline rocks, and most frequently occur bedded in it as well developed crystals, and when separated from the surrounding mass of mica, leave in it an accurately bounded, smooth sided and sharp angled im- pression of their several forms.^' The order of the formation of the minerals of granite has been a matter of frequent discussion, and the impression prevails that the mica preceded the formation of at least the quartz in that rock. Senft thus gives the result of his observations on this matter : " Potash mica shews itself most frequently associated " with amorphous quartz and with orthoclase ; with the first " usually so that it lies imbedded in its mass, which would in- " dicate a later formation for the quartz ; with the orthoclase, on " the contrary, frequently so that it appears to sit upon it, so " that one must regard the mica as the newest mineral. How- '^ ever, there are not wanting examples of the occurrence of mica " sitting upon the quartz, nor of others in which it appears so " evenly intermixed with fresh orthoclase that one must ascribe " to them a contemporaneous origin." f Senft has also the following remark on the mutual relations of oligoclase and hornblende: "Where oligoclase occurs in very " distinct intermixture with crystals of hornblende, it, for the " most part, surrounds them, and, indeed, often completely encloses " them in its mass. This relation plainly indicates that although " both minerals were produced in one and the same original "magma, nevertheless, the hornblende was the first born, and the " oligoclase was obliged to produce itself out of that part of the *' magma remaining after the formation of the hornblende." ♦ Felsgemengthelle, p. 707, f Felsgemengtheilcj p. 707. Vot. VI, K No. 3. 274 1?HE CANADIAN NATURALIST; [Vol. \l The study of the manner and order of the formation of cry- stalline minerals in coarse-grained, compound crystalline rocks, has not, on the whole, had that attention which it deserves. On the other hand many of the results obtained in the microscopical examination of fine-grained original rocks have an important bearing upon this subject. Vogelsang* has described with the most painstaking accuracy his observations on the mutual rela- tions of the minerals of many pitchstones, trachytes and por- phyries. Mention must first be made of a very interesting phe- nomenon which he has detected in the microscopical structure of many trachytic and porphyritic rocks. This is called Fluidal- structure, and seems to have been discovered somewhat earlier and independently by E. VVeiss.f This term is to be under- stood to denote such a position of the constituents of a rock re- latively to each other, as to allow of the inference being drawn that a movement of the mass either as a whole or in its smallest parts, had taken place while the process of crystallisation or solidification was going on. Eight different illustrations of this phenomenon are given in the beautifully coloured plates accom- panying Vogelsang's work. One of these shews a trachytic pitchstone from the Eugaueau hills magnified 100 times. In a brownish perfectly vitreous matrix there are found yellowish grains of glassy felspar, needles of hornblende and microscopical crystals of magnetite. The whole of the vitreous matrix is, be- sides, filled with small prismatic crystals which are sharply distinguishable from the dark ground. These, Vogelsang hesitiites to declare to be felspars, and in the meantime, for con- venience sake, terms them " microlites." These little crystals are quite frequent in many rocks, and it is possible to distinguish light and dark coloured microlites, the former being in all likeli- hood scapolites or felspars, the latter augites or hornblendes. The figure shews the position of these little crystals in relation to the larger ones above named, and it is easily observed that the former lie with their longest axes parallel to each other except in the neighbourhood of the larger crystals of felspar, hornblende and magnetite, around certain sides of which they crowd more closely than elsewhere. The drawing shews the eff'ect of the * Beitriige zur Kemctuiss der Feldspath bildung, Haarlem, 1866. f Vogelsang — Philosophic der Geologie nnd Microscopische Ges- teins-studien'=Bonn, 1867. No. 3.] MACFARLANE— ON CRYSTALLINE ROCKS. 275 last movement of the mass at the moment of its final solidifica- tion. The observer can plainly see that this movement proceeded from right to left, crowded the microlites against the right sides of the larger previously formed crystals, and then carried them past these in the direction of the flow, namely, towards the left. The fiirure further shews that one large dark coloured crystal of hornblende had been broken into two pieces, and that the smallest of these, after the fracture, had been caused by the motion of the mass to assume a new position against the end of the larger piece. There can be no doubt, says Vogelsang, as to this fact, for each piece possesses a crystalline and a fractured end, and at the latter, in the larger piece, a crystal of magnetite is seen which corresponds exactly to a space visible in the broken end of the smaller piece. The crystal has evidently been broken at this weak place, and the pieces afterwards turned and pressed against each other. Sometimes the felspar crystals in this rock shew a lio-ht brown ed<2;e round the clear central mass of the crystal. \Yhen more strongly magnified, it becomes plain that the brown vitreous matrix has penetrated the crystal in innumer- able places by the cleavage planes. In some crystals this only takes place to a certain depth ; others are penetrated through and through by the matrix. Fluidal-structure, sometimes closely resembling that just described and sometimes considerably mo- dified, has been observed by Vogelsang in the basalts of Unkel and Obercassel, in the lava of the island of Ischia, in the diabase of Weilburg on the Sahn, in the quartzose trachyte of Cam- piglia, in the black pitchstone of Zwickau, and in the quartzose porphyry of Wurtzen in Saxony. Another figure gives a repre- sentation of a part of the last named rock magnified 200 times. In this example the Fluidal-structure is not indicated by the position of crystals previously developed, but by a varied colour- ing which corresponds to difi'erences of densities in the vitreous matrix. A similar appearance is frequently visible in window glass when its substance has not been rendered perfectly homo- geneous in the manufacture. Through the whole of the matrix of this rock there are scattered very fine black points, but these are found much less frequently in the dark than in the light- coloured portions of the matrix. Many of the facts observed by the naked eye, concerning the order of the formation of rock minerals, are confirmed by Vogelsang's researches with the microscope, Especially 276 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. decided is the result as regards magnetite, which is invariably observed to be the oldest formed mineral in the more recent eruptive rocks, all the crystalline constituents of which enclose it. The felspars contained in trachytes, basalts, dolerites, and melaphyres, and the augites and hornblendes of the same rocks, all found the magnetite ready formed when their developement began, and enclosed it as their growth progressed. Even leucite and olivine, which are ordinarily free from foreign enclosures, are found to contain magnetite. On the other hand magnetite is seldom enclosed by quartz, but it is to be remembered that rhyolites very seldom carry the former mineral. In the matrices of many basalts, melaphyres and trachytes, which, in an unde- composed condition, present under the microscope a mass of microlites, the magnetite is found inserted between the needles and determining their limits. The andesite of Lowenburg in Siebengebirge shews, under the microscopCj many of these phe- nomena clearly and distinctly. In considering the observations that have been made on this subject one cannot avoid remarking that magnetite, tourmaline, and other basic accessory minerals, appear to have been the first to separate from the solidifying magma of crystalline rocks. After the very basic minerals the essential constituents seem to have been formed somewhat in the following order : 1st. Mica ; 2nd, Hornblende ; 3rd. Felspar ; 4th. Quartz. It would, there- fore, seem possible to recognise the operation of a definite law in the order of the separation of these minerals from their mother magma, namely, that the minerals of original rocks have crystal- lised out in the order of their basicity. Some facts, in bupport of the existence of such a law, are observable in connection with the composition of porphyritic rocks. Not unfrequently the felspar crystals found in these, and which we must suppose, in accordance with facts stated above, to have been produced pre- vious to the solidification of their matrices, have a more basic composition than the latter, or, what amounts to the same thing, the composition of the matrices is more siliceous than that of the whole rock including the crystals. Thus, according to Laspeyres, the felsitic porphyry of Muhlberg, near Halle, enclosing colour- less sanidine, oligoclase, quartz and a little mica, contains 72,24 p. c. silica, while the dark greyish green matrix contains 74,41 p. c. Again, the porphyrite of Ganse-Schnabel, near Ilfeld, con- taining triclinic felspar aud other crystals has a silica contents No. 3.] MACPARLANE— ON CRYSTALLINE ROCKS. 277 of 64.34 p. c. The homogeneous, nearly infusible matrix of the same rock contains 67.36 p. c. of silica. The labradorite por- phyrite of Miihleuthal, near Elbingerode in the Hartz, possesses a black, very fresh and hard matrix, which encloses undecom- posed very lustrous crystals of labradorite, and a dark green or black augitic or hornblendic mineral. The labradorite contains 51.11 p. c. silica, while the whole rock, in spite of the presence of the, doubtless more basic, black mineral, contains 57.57 p. c. silica. On the other hand, in many porphyries and rhyolites distinct quartz crystals are developed, which, of course, must be more acid than the enclosing matrix. In spite of this exception, the law above referred to still applies so far as regards the minerals developed in crystalline rocks or separated out from their matrices during solidification, VIII. — SPECIFIC GRAVITY, It has been already remarked that in general the specific gravity of original rocks decreases with the increase of silica and increases with the decrease in quantity of the same substance ; the most acid rocks are specifically the lightest, the most basic rocks are specifically the heaviest. Abich was the first to call attention to this as exhibited among the volcanic rocks, and to shew the conclusion^ which might be drawn regarding the silica contents of these rocks from their ascertained specific gravities. Although the same relation has been observed to exist among the granitic and porphyritic rocks, and doubtless runs through all the orders, it has not been found that a certain specific gravity invariably corresponds to a certain degree of silicification or that, for instance, because a syenite containins; 59.83 p. c. of silica has a specific gravity of 2,730, a trachyte having the same silica contents will have the same specific gravity. On the contrary we find decided differences as to specific gravity in rocks of similar composition, but belonging to different orders of texture. The following table shews the average specific gravity of the various families of granular, porphyritic and trachytic rocks : GEANULAK. PORPHYRITIC. TRACHYTIC. Hypersilicic rocks with over 77 p. c. silica. Pegmatites below 2.6 Qunrtzporph, below 2.6 Q. trachyte below 2.57 Silicic. . . 70 to 77 p.c. silica Granites. . 2.65 to "2.6 Porphyry. . . 2.tvi to 2.6 Hhy.rte ... 2.62 to 2.57 Siliceous (5.3 to 70 " Grsinitites 2.72 to 2.65 Purphvrite,. 2.75 to 2.ft5 Trachyte .. . 2.7 to 2.62 Neutral. 5fi to 63 " Syenites.. 2.8 to 2.72 Melaphyro.. 2.8 to 2.75 Andesite . . . 2.8 to 2.7 Basous.. 4^) to 56 Gr'nstonesS.O to 2.8 Gr, porphyry 2.9 to 2.8 Dolerite... 2.86 to 2.8 Basic ... 42 to 49 '' Anorthosyte 2.9 to 3. Aug.porpbyry 2.7 to 2,9 Nephelinite, 2,6 to 2.86 278 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. It will be observed from this table that the specific gravity of granular rocks is generally greater than that of the trachytio rocks which correspond with them in degree of acidity ; granites are heavier than rhyolites, and greenstones than dolerites. (The rule does not hold good when applied to the basic rocks, but this may be owing to the facility with which they become decomposed and absorb water, which causes a material diminution of gravity.) The porphyritic rocks seem to occupy a position between the other two series, being neither so dense, relatively, as the granular nor so light as the trachytic rocks. This would seem to indicate that the coarsely granular rocks crystallised more slowly and perfectly than the porphyries and the latter more than the tra- chytes. This diflPerence in density between rocks having the same percentage of silica is even more observable between trachytic and vitreous rocks. Obsidian has invariably a much less specific gravity than a quartzose trachyte which possesses the same percentage of silica. Thus we have the specific gravity of Khyolite from Palmarola with 74.54 p. c. Si. Og = 2-529 Obsidian from Lipari with 74.05 " = 2.370 Quartz trachyte from Besobdal, Asia Minor, with 76.56 " =2.656 Obsidian from Little Ararat with 77.27 " =2.394 The cause of the difi"^rence se^ms merelv to be that while the rhyolites cooled slowly and shrank together to a denser mass, the obsidians are quickly cooled unannealed natural glasses. It is well known that garnet, vesuvianite, orthoclase, labradorite, augite, and olivine have their densities much decreased by being fused and quickly cooled, and the same thing has been remarked with regard to rocks. St. Claire Deville, and Delesse experi- mented on several rocks, and found that their specific gravities were diminished after fusion. St. Claire Deville's results were as follows : Specific Specific Gravities Gravities before fusion, afterfusion. Vitreous lava from the Peak of Tenerifte 2.570 2.464 Trachyte from Chahorra 2.727 2.61 7 Basaltic lava from the Peak of los Majorquines 2.945 2.836 Basalt from Pic de Foga, Cape of Good Hope.. 2.971 2.879 Granite from Andoux 2.662 2.360 Delesse found the loss to be less with fine-grained and semi- vitreous rocks than with those of a distinctly crystalline character. According to his results, if the rocks experimented on be arranged according to the degree of diminution which their specific gravities undergo in fusion, beginning with those which experience greatest (( (( No. 3.] MACFARLANE—ON CRYSTALLINE ROCKS. 279 loss, those rocks will be found at the head of the list )s-hich are commonly considered to be the oldest in age. Delesse found the following per centages of diminution, the specific gravity of the various rocks before fusion being regarded as = 100. Granite, graniilite and quartz porphyry 9 — 11 p. c. Syenitic granite, and syenite 8 — 9 " Porphyry with orthoclase and oligoclase, with and without quartz 8 — 10 Diorite and diorite porphyry 6 — 8 Melaphyre 5 — 7 Basalt, tracliyte, and old volcanic rocks 3 — 5 '? Lavas and volcanic rocks 0 — 4 " As early as 18-41, Gustav Bischof made observations on the comparative volumes of Basalt, Trachyte and Granite in their crystalline, melted, and vitreous conditions, with the following results : Volume in vitreous condition. in crj'stalline. Basalt 1 0.9298 Trachyte 1 0.9?14 Granite . , . . 1 0 8420 Volume in a fluid state. , in crystalline. Basalt 1 .' 0.8960 Trachyte 1 0.8187 Granite 1 ,. 0.7431 Nothing can be more obvious from these data and experiments than that original rocks in cooling, solidifying and crystallising, underwent contraction, increasing thereby their density, and that the amount of contraction was the greater the more thoroughly und coarsely crystalline the rock, and the earlier the dates of its eruption in the geological history of the earth. It is not custo- mary in treating of eruptive rocks usually to entertain any very definite ideas as to their age, but it ought not to be forgotten that the geological experience of Europe has shewn that they made their appearance on the earth's surface somewhat in the game order as they occupy in Table III. It would therefore eeem that those rocks which have experienced most perfect crys- tallisation and the greatest amount of contraction or increase of density during that process are the oldest in geological age, that those which have crystallised imperfectly and experienced but a moderate amount of contraction, belong to the middle age of geological history, and that those which have solidified quickly to a semi-vitreous condition, and have experienced in so doing scarcely any contraction, are exactly those which are the most recent, and have been denominated volcanic rocks. Such results ought not to surprise us, but ought rather to be anticipated if 280 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST, [Vol. vi, the theory of the original igneous fluidity of the globe be well founded. The enormous degree of heat, which only could have occasioned such a condition, could not have disappeared suddenly, A gradual decrease of temperature must have taken place from the time when the solidification of the earth be2;an down to recent geological periods. It follows that this gradually decreas- ing temperature must have had more or less influence upon the cooling of the various rocks protruded through the earth's crust during different geological ages. Those which appeared in earlier periods must have cooled when the earth's temperature was very high, and must therefore have enjoyed the most favorable con- ditions for slow and perfect crystallization and great contraction of volume, while on the other hand, those which were erupted in later ages must have appeared at a time when the temperature had much diminished, and consequently they must have solidified much more rapidly, crystallised much more imperfectly, and ex- perienced less increase of density than their predecessors. Thus there can be distinctly traced a very decided connection between the universally accepted theory of the earth's original fluid con, dition and many of the facts which have been here stated with regard to the density of original rocks. But although, generally, definite relations can be shewn to exist between the age and texture of rocks, it is not to be sup- posed that this is invariably the case, that there are no exceptions to the rule. It is not to be forgotten that other conditions be- sides the temperature of the earth's surface may have exerted their influence. Thus it is frequently the case that veins or dykes of diorite have in the centre a distinctly compound tex- ture, while toward the sides they become almost impalpable. Then again beds of basaltite are often seen to be in the upper part and at the bottom fine-grained and compact, while in the middle they are small-grained and variolitic in texture. It is also frequently to be observed that masses of granite distinctly granular in the centre, assume towards the periphery a schistose texture, the direction of which is most generally parallel to the line of junction with the neighbouring rock. Thus it appears that in the solidification of a rock, the space which it occupied, the pressure to which it was exposed, the temperature of the enclosing rocks at the time of eruption, and the circumstances under which it was erupted, whether, for instance, on land or under water, must have influenced more or less its resulting density as well as its texture. No. 3.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 281 HISTORY OF THE NAMES CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN IN GEOLOGY. By T. Sterry Hunt, LL.D., F.R.S. It is proposed in the following pages to give a concise account of the progress of investigation of the lower paleozoic rocks during the last forty years. The subject may naturally be divided into three parts : 1. The history of Silurian and Upper Cam- brian in Great Britain from 1831 to 1854; 2. That of the still more ancient paleozoic rocks in Scandinavia, Bohemia, and Great Britain up to the present time, including the recognition by Bar- rande of the so-called primordial paleozoic fauna ] 3. The history of the lower paleozoic rocks of North America. I. Silurian and Upper Cambrian in Great Britain. Less than forty years since, the various uncrystalline sedimen- tary rocks beneath the coal-formation in Great Britain and in continental Europe were classed together under the common name of graywacke or grauwacke, a term adopted by geologists from German miners, and originally applied to sandstones and other coarse sedimentary deposits, but extended so as to include associated argillites and limestones. Some progress had been made in the study of this great Graywacke formation, as it was called, and organic remains had been described from various parts of it ; but to two British geologists was reserved the honor of bringing order out of this hitherto confused group of strata, and establishing on stratigraphical and paleontological grounds a succession and a geological nomenclature. The work of these two investigators was begun independently and simultaneously in different parts of Great Britain. In 1831 and 1832, Sedgwick made a careful section of the rocks of North Wales from the Menai Strait across the range of Snowdon to the Berwyn hills, thus traversing in a south-eastern direction Caernarvon, Denbigh and Merionethshire. Already, he tells us, he had in 1831, made out the relations of the Bangor group, (including the Llan- berris slates and the overlying Harlech grits.) and showed that the fossiliferous strata of Sneddon occupy a synclinal, and are stratigraphically several thousand feet above the horizon of the 282 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST, [Vol. vi. latter. Following up this investigation in 1832, he established the great Merioneth anticlinal, which brings up the lower rocks on the south-east side of Snowdon, and is the key to the struc- ture of North Wales. From these, as a base, he constructed a section along the line already indicated, over Great Arenig to the Bala limestone, the whole forming an ascending series of enorm- ous thickness. This limestone in the Berwyn hills is overlaid by many thousand feet of strata as we proceed eastward along the line of section, until at length the eastern dip of the strata is exchanged for a westward one, thus giving to the Berwyn chain, like that of Snowdon, a synclinal structure. As a consequence of this, the limestone of Bala re-appears on the eastern side of the Berwyus, underlaid as before by a descending series of slates and porphyries. These results, with sections, were brought before the British Association for the Advancement of Science at its meeting at Oxford, in 1832, but only a brief and imperfect ac- count of the communication of Sedgwick on this occasion appears in the Proceedings of the Association. He did not at this time give any distinctive name to the series of rocks in question. [L E. & D. Philos. Mag. [1854] IV, viii, 495.] Meanwhile, in the same year, 1831, Murchison began the examination of the rocks on the river Wye, along the southern border of Radnorshire. In the next four years he extended his researches through this and the adjoining counties of Hereford and Salop, distinguishing in this region four separate geological formations, each characterized by peculiar fossils. These forma- tions were moreover traced by him to the south-westward across the counties of Brecon and Caermarthen ; thus forming a belt of fossiliferous rocks stretching from near Shrewsbury to the mouth of the river Towey, a distance of about 100 miles along the north-west border of the great Old Bed sandstone formation, as it was then called, of the west of England. The results of his labors among the rocks of this region for the first three years were set forth by Murchison in two papers pre- sented by him to the Geological Society of London in January, 1834. [Proc. Geol. Soc. II., 11.] The formations were then named as follows in descending order: 1. Ludlow, 2. Wenlock, constituting together an upper group ; 3. Caradoc, 4. Llandeilo (or Builth) forming a lower group. The Llandeilo formation, according to him, was underlaid by what he called the Longmynd and Gwastaden rocks. The non-fossiliferous strata of the Long- No. 3.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 283 mynd hills in Shropshire were described as rising up to the east from beneath the Llandeilo rocks ; and as appearing again in South Wales, at the same geological horizon, at Gwastaden in Brecon- shire, and to the west of Llandovery in Caermarthenshire ; con- stituting an underlying series of contorted slaty rocks many thousand feet in thickness, and destitute of organic remains. The position of these rocks in South Wales was, however, to the north-west, while the strata of the Longmynd, as we have seen, appear to the east of the fossilifevous formations. In the Philosophical Magazine for July, 1835, Murchison gave to the four formations above named the desio-nation of Silurian, in allusion, as is well known, to the ancient British tribe of the Silures. It now became desirable to find a suitable name for the great inferior series, which, according to Murchison, rose from beneath his lowest Silurian formations to the north- west, and appeared to be widely spread in Wales. Knowing that Sedgwick had long been engaged in the study of these rocks, Murchison, as he tells us, urged him to give them a British geo- graphical name. Sedgwick accordingly proposed for this great series of Welsh rocks, the appropriate designation of Cambrian, which was at once adopted by Murchison for the strata supposed by him to underlie his Silurian system. [Murchison, Anniv. Address, 1842; Proc. Geol. Soc. III., 641.] This was almost simultaneous with the giving of the name of Silurian, for in August, 1835, Sedgwick and Murchison made communications to the British Association at Dublin on Cambrian and Silurian Rocks. These, in the volume of Proceedings (pp. 59, 60) appear as a joint paper, though from the text they would seem to have been separate. Sedgwick then described the Cambrian rocks of North Wales as including three divisions: 1. The Upper Cam- brian which occupies the greater part of the chain of the Berwyns, where, according to him, it was connected with the Llandeilo formation of the Silurian. To the next lower division, Sedgwick gave the name of Middle Cambrian, making up all the higher mountains of Caernarvon and Merionethshire, and including the roofing-slates and flagstones of this region. This middle group, according to him, afi'orded a few organic remains, as at the top of Snowdon. The inferior division, desiirnated as Lower Cam- brian, included the crystalline rocks of the south-west coast of Caernarvon and a considerable portion of Anglesea, and con- sisted of chloritic and micaceous schists, with slaty quartzites and 284 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST, [Vol, vi, subordinate beds of serpentine and granular limestone; the -whole without organic remains. These crystalline rocks were, however, soon afterwards excluded by him from the Cambrian series, for in 1838 [Proc. Geol. Soc. II, 679] Sedojwick describes further the section from the Menai Strait to the Berwyns, and assigns to the chloritic and micaceous schists of Anglesea and Caernarvon a position inferior to the Cambrian, which he divides into two parts; viz,, Lower Cambrian, comprehending the old slate series, up to the Bala limestone beds ; and Upper Cambrian, including the Bala beds and the strata above them in the Berwyn chain, to which he gave the name of the Bala group. The dividing line between the two portions was subsequently extended downwards by Sedgwick to the summit of the Arenig slates and porphyries. The lower division was afterwards subdivided by him into the Bangor group, (to which the name of Lower Cambrian was henceforth to be restricted,) including the Llanberris roofing-slates and the Harlech grits or Barmouth sandstones ; and the Festiniog group, which included the Lingula-flags ^nd the succeeding Tremadoc slates. In the communication of Murchison to the same Dublin meet- ing, in August, 1835, he repeated the description of the four formations to which he had just given the nnme of Silurian; which were, in descending order, Ludlow and Wenlock (Upper Silurian), and Caradoc and Llandeilo (Lower Silurian). The latter formation was then declared by Murchison to constitute the base of the Silurian system, and to offer in many places in South Wales distinct passages to the underlying slaty rocks, which were, according to him, the Upper Cambrian of Sedgwick. Meanwhile, to go back to 1834, we find that after Murchison had, in his communication to the Geological Society, defined the relation of his Llandeilo formation to the underlying slaty series, but before the names of Silurian and Cambrian had been given to these respectively, Sedgwick and Murchison visited together the principal sections of these rocks from Caermarthenshire to Den- bighshire. The greater part of this region was then unknown to Sedgwick, but had been already studied by Murchison, who in- terpreted the sections to his companion in conformity with the scheme already given ; according to which the beds of the Llan- deilo were underlaid by the slaty rocks ^rhich appear along their north-western border. When, however, they entered the region which had already been examined by Sedgwick, and reached the No. 3.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 285 section on the east side of the Berwyns, the fossiliferous beds of Meifod were at once pronounced by Murchison to be typical Caradoc, while others in the vicinity were regarded as Llandeilo. The beds of Meifod had, on paleontological grounds, been by Sedgwick identified with those of Glyn Ceirog, which are seen to be immediately overlaid by Wenlock rocks. These determina- tions of Murchison were, as Sedgwick tells us, accepted by him with great reluctance, inasmuch as they involved the upper part of his Cumbrian section in most perplexing difficulties. When however, they crossed together the Berwyn chain to Bala, the limestones in this locality were found to contain fossils nearly agreeing with those of the so-called Caradoc of Meifod. The examination of the section here presented showed, however, that these limestones are overlaid by a series of several thousand feet of strata bearing no resemblance either in fossils or in physical characters to the Wenlock formation which overlies the Caradoc beds of Glyn Ceirog. This series was, therefore, by Murchison supposed to be identical with the rocks which, in South Wales, he had placed beneath the Llandeilo, and he expressly declared that the Bala group could not be brought within the limits of his Silurian system. It may here be added that in 1842 Sedgwick re-examined this region, accompanied by that skilled paleontologist, Salter, confii-ming the accuracy of his former sections, and showing moreover by the evidence of fossils that the beds of Meifod, Glyn Ceirog and Bala are very nearly on one parallel. Yet, with the evidence of the fossils before him, Murchison, in 1834, placed the first two in his Silurian system, and the last deep down in the Upper Cambrian ; and consequently was aware that on paleontological grounds it was impossible to separate the lower portion of his Silurian system from the Upper Cambrian of Sedgwick. (These names are here used for con- venience; although we are speaking of a time when they had not been applied to designate the rocks in question.) This fact was repeatedly insisted upon by Sedgwick, who, in the Syllabus of his Cambridge lectures, published very early in 1837, enumerated the principal genera and species of Upper Cambrian fossils, many of which were by him declared to be the same with those of the Lower Silurian rocks of Murchison. Again, in enumerating in the same Syllabus the characteristic species of the Bala limestone, it is added by Sedgwick : " all of which are com- mon to the Lower Silurian system." This was again insisted 286 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. upon by him in 1838 and 1841. [Proc. Geol. Soc. II, 679; III, 548.] It was not until 1840 that Bowman announced the same conclusion, which was reiterated by Sharpe in 1842. [Ram- say, Mem. Geol. Sur. Ill, part 2, page 6.] In 1839, Murchison published his Silurian System, dedicated to Sedgwick, a magnificent work in two volumes quarto, with a separate map, numerous sections and figures of fossils. The succession of the Silurian rocks, as there given, was precisely that already set forth by the author in 1834, and again in 1835 ; being, in descending order, Ludlow and Wenlock, constituting the Upper Silurian, and Caradoc and Llandeilo (including the Lower Llandeilo beds or Stiper-stones), the Lower Silurian. These are underlaid by the Cambrian rocks, into which the Llan- deilo was said to ofier a transition marked by beds of passage. Murchison, in fact, declared that it was impossible to draw any line of separation either lithological, zoological or stratigraphical between the base of the Silurian beds (Llandeilo) and the upper portion of the Cambrian, — the whole forming, according to him, in Caermarthenshire, one continuous and conformable series from the Cambrian to the Ludlow. [Silurian System, pages 256, 358.] By Cambrian in this connection we are to understand only the Upper Cambrian or Bala group of Sedgwick, as appears from the express statement of Murchison, who alludes to the Cambrian of Sedgwick as including all the older slaty rocks of Wales, and as divided into three groups, but proceeds to say that in his present work (the Silurian System) he shall notice only the highest of these three. Since January, 1834, when Murchison first announced the stratigraphical relations of the lower division of what he after- wards called the Silurian system, the aspect of the case had materially changed. This divibion was no longer underlaid, both to the east in Shropshire and to the west in Wales, by a great unfossiliferous series. His observations in the vicinity of the Berwyn hills with Sedgwick in 1834, and the subsequently pub- lished statements of the latter had shown, that this supposed older series was not without fossils ; but on the contrary, in North Wales, at least, held a fauna identical with that characterising the Lower Silurian. Hence the assertion of Murchison in his Silurian System, in 1839, that it was not possible to draw any line of demarcation between them. The position was very em- barrassing to the author of the Siliman System, and for the mo- No. 3.] iFIUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 287 ment. not less so to the discoverer of the Upper Cambrian series. Meanwhile, the latter, as we have seen, in 1842 re-exauiined with Salter his Upper Cambrian sections in North Wales, and satisfied himself of the correctness, both structurally and paleon- toloi»;ically, of his former determinations. Murchison, in his an- niversary address as President of the Geological Society in 1842, after recounting, as we have already done, the history of the naming by Sedgwick in 1835, of the Cambrian series, which Murchison supposed to underlie his Silurian system, proceeded as follows : " Nothing precise was then known of the organic con- tents of this lower or Cambrian system except that some of the fossils contained in its upper members in certain prominent lo- calities were published Lower Silurian species. Meanwhile, by adopting the word Cambrian, my friend and myself were certain that whatever might prove to be its zoulogicd distinctions, this great system of slaty rocks being evidently inferior to those zones which had been worked out as Silurian types, no ambiguity could hereafter arise. * * * In regard, however, to a descending zoological order it still remained to be proved whether there was any type of fossils in the mass of the Cambrian rocks difi"erent from those of the Lower Silurian series. If the appeal to na- ture should be answered in the negative, then it was clear that the Lower Silurian type must be considered the true base of what I had named the protozoic rocks ; but if characteristic new forms were discovered, then would the Cambrian rocks, whose place was so well established in the descending series, have also their own fauna, and the p ileozoic base would necessarily be re- moved to a lower horizon." If the first of these alternatives should be established, or in other words, if the fauna of the Cambrian rocks was found to be identical with that of the Lower Silurian, then, in the author's language, " the term Cambrian must cease to be used in zoological classification, it being, in that sense, synonymous with Lower Silurian." That such was the result of paleontological inquiry, Murchison proceeded to show by repeating the announcements already made by Sedgwick in 1837 and 183i^, that the collections made by the latter from the great series of fossiliferous strata in the Berwyns, from Bala, from Snowdon and other Cambrian tracts, were identical with the Lower Silurian forms. These strata, it was said, contain throughout " the same forms of Orthis which typify the Lower Silurian rocks." It was farther declared by Murchison in this 288 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. address, that researches in Germany, Belgium and Russia led to the conclusion that the " fossiliferous strata characterized by Lower Silurian Orthidaa are the oldest beds in which organic life has been detected." [Proc. Geol. Soc. Ill, 641, et seq.] The Orthids here referred to are, according to Salter, Ortliis caUigramma, Dalm, and its varieties. [Mem. Geol. Survey III, part 2. 335- 337.] Meanwhile Sedgwick's views and position began to be misre- presented. In 1842, Mr. Sharpe, after calling attention to the fact that the fossils of the Bala limestone were, as Sedgwick had long before shown, identical with those of Murchison's Lower Silurian, declared that Sedgwick had placed the Upper Cambrian, in which the Bala beds were included, beneath the Silurian, and that this determination had been adopted by Murchison on Sedg- wick's authority. [Proc. Geol. Soc. IV, 10.] This statement Murchison suffered to pass uncorrected in a complimentary re- view of Sharpe's paper in his next annual address (1843). In his JSUuria, 1st edition, page 25, (1854) he speaks of the term Cambrian as applied (in 1835) by Sedgwick and himself " to a vast succession of fossiliferous strata containing undescribed fossils, the whole of which were supposed to rise up from beneath well-known Silurian rocks. The Government geologists have shown i\idiii\i\^ supposed order of superposition was erroneous," &c. 5^he italics are the author's. Such language, coupled with Mr. Sharpe's assertion noticed above, helped to fix upon Sedgwick the responsibility of Murchison's error. Although the historical sketch, which precedes, clearly shows the real position of Sedg- wick in the matter, we may quote farther his own words : *' I have often spoken of the great Upper Cambrian group of North Wales as inferior to the Silurian system, * ^ * ^i^ ^i^ on the sole authority of the Lower Silurian sections, and the author's many times repeated explanations of them before they were published. So great was my confidence in his work that I received it as per- fectly established truth that his order of superposition was un- assailable. ^ ^ ^ ^ I asserted again and again that the Bala limestone was near the base of the so-called Upper Cambrian group. Murchison asserted and illustrated by sections the un- varying fact that his Llandeilo flag was superior to the Upper Cambrian group. There was no difference between us until his Llandeilo sections were proved to be wrong." [Philos. Mag. IV, viii, 506.] That there must be a great mistake either in Sedg- No. 3.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 28^ wick's or in Murcliison's sections was evident, and the Government surveyors, while sustaining the correctness of those of Sedgwick, have shown the sections of Murchison to have been completely erroneous. The first step towards an exposure of the errors of the Silurian sections is, however, due to Sedgwick and McCoy. In order better to understand the present aspect of the question it will be necessary to state in a few words some of the results which have been arrived at by the Government surveyors in their studies of the rocks in question, as set forth by Ramsay in the Memoirs of the Geological Survey. In the section of the Berwyns, the thin bed of about twenty feet of Bala limestone, which, (as originally described by Sedgwick) they have found outcropping on both sides of the synclinal chain, is shown to be intercalated in a vast thickness of Caradoc rocks ; being overlaid by about 3,300 and underlaid by 4,500 feet of strata belonging to this formation. Beneath these are 4,500 feet additional of beds de- scribed as Llandeilo, which rest unconformably upon the Lingula- flags just to the west of Bala ; thus making a thickness of over 12,000 feet of strata belonging to the Bala group of Sedgwick. A small portion of rocks referred to the Wenlock formation oc- cupies the synclinal above mentioned. [Memoirs, III, part 2, 214, 222.] The second member, in ascending order, of the Silurian system, to which the name of Caradoc was given by him in 1839, was originally described by Murchison under the names of the Horderley and 31 ay Hill sandstone. The higher portions of the Caradoc were subsequently distinguished by the Government sur- veyors as the Lower and Upper Llandovery rocks ; the latter (con- stituting the May Hill sandstone, and known also as the Penta- merus beds, being by them regarded as the summit of the Caradoc formation. In 1852, however, Sedgwick and McCoy showed from its fauna that the May Hill sandstone belongs rather to the overlying Wenlock than to the Caradoc formation, and marks a distinct paleontological horizon. This discovery led the geological surveyors to re-examine the Silurian sections, when it was found by Aveline that there exists in Shropshire a complete and visible want of conformity between the underlying formations and the May Hill sandstone ; the latter in some places resting upon the nearly vertical Longmynd rocks, and in others upon the Llandeilo flags, the Caradoc proper or Bala group, and the Lower Llandovery beds. Again, in Vol. VI. L No. 3, 290 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. South \Yales, near Builth, the May Hill sandstone or Upper Llandovery rests upon Lower Llandeilo beds ; while 'at Noeth Grug- the overlying formation is traced transgressively from the Lower Llandovery across the Caradoc to the Llandeilo. These important results were soon confirmed by Ramsay and by Sedgwick. [Ibid, 4, 236.] The May Hill s mdstone often includes, near its base, conglomerate beds made up of the ruins of the older forma- tion. To the north-east, in the typical Silurian country, it is of great thickness and continuity, but gradually thins out to the Bouth-west. There exists, moreover, another region where not less curious discoveries were made. About forty miles to the eastward of the typic-il region in South Wales appear some important areas of Silurian rocks. These are the Woolhope beds, appearing through the Old Red sandstone, and the deposits of Abberley, the Mal- verns and May Hill, rising along its eastern border, and covered along their eastern base by the newer Mesozoic sandstone. The rocks of these localities were by Murchison in his Silurian Sjjstem described as offering the complete sequence. When however it was found that his Caradoc included two unconformable series, examination showed that there was no representative of the older Caradoc or Bala group in these eastern regions, but that the so- called Caradoc was nothing but the Upper Llandovery or May Hill sandstone. The immediately underlying strata, which Mur- chison had re^'arded as Llandeilo, or rather as the beds of passage from Llandeilo to Cambrian, and had compared with the north-west parts of the Caermarthenshire sections, (Sil. Sys. 416.) have since been found to be much more ancient deposits, of Middle Cambrian age, which rest upon the crystalline hypozoic rocks of the Malverns, and are unconformably overlaid by the May Hill sandstone. We shall again revert to this region, which has been carefully studied and described by Prof. John Phillips, [Mem. Geol. S,ur. II., part 1.] What then was the value and the significance of the Silurian sections of Murchison, when examined in the light of the results of the Government surveyors ? The Llandeilo rocks, having throughout the characteristic Orthis so much insisted upon [by Murchison, were shown to be the base of a great conformable series, and to the eastward, in Shropshire, to rest on the upturned edges of the Longmynd rocks ; while westward, near Bala, they overlie uncouformably the Lingula-flags, and in the island of No. 3.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 291 An_irlesea repose directly upon the ancient crystalline schists. According to the author of the Silurian System^ there existed beneath the base of the Llandeilo formation a great con- formable series of slaty rocks into which this formation passed, and from which it could not be distinguished either zoologically, stratigraphically or lithologically. The sequence, determined from what were considered typical sections in the valley of the Towey in Caermarthenshire, as given by Murchison, for several years both before and after the publication of his work, was as follows : 1 . Cambrian ; 2. Llandeilo fligs ; 3. Caradoc sandstone ; 4. Wcnlock and Ludlow beds; 5. Old Red sandstone; the order being from north-west to south-east. What then were these fos- siliferous Cambrian beds underlying the Llandeilo and indistin- guishable from it? Sedgwick, with the aid of the Government surveyors, has answered the question in a manner which is well illustrated in his ideal section across the valley of the Towey. The whole of the Bala or Caradoc group rises in undulaticns to the north-west, while the Llandeilo flags at its base appear on an anticlinal in the valley, and are succeeded to the south-east by a portion of the Bala. The great mass of this group on the south-east side of the anticlinal is however concealed by the overlapping May Hill sandstone, — the base of the unconform- able upper series which includes the Wenlcck and Ludlow beds. [Philos. ^lag. IV, vili, 488.] The section to the s'^uth-east, commencing from the Llandeilo flags on the anticlinal, was made by Murchison the Silurian system, while the great mass of strata on the north-west side of the Llandeilo, (which is the complete representative of the Caradoc or Bala beds, partially concealed on the south-west side,) was supposed by him to lie beneath the Llandeilo, and was called Cambrian ; (the Upper Cambrian of Sedgwick). These rocks, with the Llandeilo at their base, were in fact identical with the Bala group studied by the latter in North Wales, and are now clearly traced through all the inter- mediate distance. This is admitted by Murchison, who says : " The first rectification of this erroneous view was made in 1842 by Prof. Ramsay, who observed that instead of being succeeded by lower rocks to the north and west, the Llandeilo flags folded over in those directions, and passed under superior strata, charged with fossils which Mr. Salter recognized as well-known types of the Caradoc or Bala beds." [Siluria, 4th ed., p. 57, foot-note.] The true order of succession in South Wales was iu fact: 1, 292 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. Llandeilo ; 2, Cambrian (= Caradoc or Bala) ; 3, Wenlock and Ludlow ; 4, Old Red sandstone ; the Caradoc or Bala beds being repeated on the two sides of the anticlinal, but in great part concealed on the south-east side by the overlapping May Hill or Upper Llandovery rocks. These latter, as has been shown, form the true base of the upper series which, in the Silurian sections, was represented by the Wenlock and Ludlow. Murchi- son had, by a strange oversight, completely inverted the order of his lower series, and turned the inferior members upside down. In fact, the Llandeilo flags, instead of being, as he had main- tained, superior to the Cambrian (Caradoc or Bala) beds, were really inferior to them, and were only made Silurian by a great mistake. The Caradoc, under different names, was thus made to do duty at two horizons in the Silurian S3stem, both below and above the Llandeilo flags. Nor was this all, for by another error, as we have seen, the Caradoc in the latter position was made to include the Pentamerus beds of the unconformably overlying series. Thus it clearly appears that with the exception of the relations of the Wenlock and Ludlow beds to each other and to the overlying Old Red sandstone, which were correctly deter mined, the Silurian system of Murchison was altogether incorrect, and was moreover based upon a series of stratigraphical mistakes, which are scarcely paralleled in the history of geological investi- gation. It was thus that the Lower Silurian was imposed on the scien- tific world ; and we may well ask with Sedgwick, whether geologists " would have accepted the Lower Silurian classification and nomenclature had they known that the physical or sectional evidence upon which it was based had been, from the first, po- sitively misunderstood." Feeling that his own sections were, as has since been fully established, free from error, Sedgwick na- turally thought his name of Upper Cambrian should prevail for the great Bala group. Hence the long and embittered discussion that followed, in which Murchison, in many respects, occupied a position of vantage as against the Cambridge professor, and finally saw his name of Lower Silurian supplant almost etitirely that of Upper Cambrian given by Sedgwick, who had first rightly defined and interpreted the geological relations of the group. In a paper read before the Geological Society in June, 1843, [Proc. Geol Soc. IV, 212-223] when the perplexity in which the relations of the Upper Cambrian and Lower Silurian rocks were No. 3.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 293 involved had not been cleared up by the discovery of Murchison's errors in stratigraphy, Sedgwick proposed a compromise, accord- ing to which the strata from the Bala limestone to the base of the Wenlock were to take the name of Cambro-Silurian ; while that of Siluriin should be reserved for the Wenlock and Ludlow beds, and for those below the B ila the name of Cambrian should be retained. The Festinios: group (including what were subse- quently named the Lingult-flags and the Trcmadoc slates) would thus be Upper instead of Middle Cambrian, the original Upper Cambrian being henceforth Cambro-Silurian; it being understood that, wherever the dividing line miuht be drawn, all the groups above it should be called Cambro-Silurian, and all those below it Cambrian. This compromise was rejected by Murchison, who in the map accompanying the first edition of his Siluria, in 1854, extended the Lower Silurian color so as to include all but the lowest division of the Cambrian; viz., the Bangor group. When, however, the relations of Upper Cambrian and Silurian were made known by the discoveries of Sedgwick and the Government surveyors, this compromise was seen to be uncalled for, and was withdrawn in 1854 by Sedgwick, who re-claimed the name of Upper Cambrian for his B ila group. In June, 1843, Sedgwick proposed that the whole of the fos- giliferous rocks below the horizon of the Wenlock should be designated Protozoic, and on the 29th of November, 1843. pre- sented to the Geological Society an elaborate paper on the Older Paleozoic (Protozoic) Rocks of North Wales, with a colored geological map. This paper, which embodied the results of the researches of Sedgwick and Salter, was not, however published at length, but an abstract of it was prepared by Mr. AVarburton, then president of the society, with a reduced copy of the map. [Proc. Geol. Soc. IV, 212 and 251-268 ; also Geol. Jour. I, 5-22.] In this map of Sedgwick's three divisions were established, viz., the hypozoic crystalline schists of Caernarvonshire, the " Proto- zoic,'' and the " Silurian." On the legend of the reduced map, as published by the Geological Society, these latter names were altered so as read ^^ Loicer Silurian (Protozoic)'' and " Upper Silurian.'^ These changes, in conformity with the nomenclature of Murchison, were, it is unnecessary to say, made without the knowledge of Sedgwick, who did not inspect the reduced and altered map until it was appealed to as an evidence that he had abandoned his former ground, and had recognized the equivalency 294 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST, [Vol. vi. of the whole of his Cambrian with the Lower Silurian of Mur- chison. The reader will sympathize with the indignation with which Sedgwick declares that his map was " most unwarrantably tampered with," and will, moreover, learn with surprise, that an inspection of the proof-sheets of Warburton's abstract of Sedgwick's paper was refused him, notwithstanding his repeated solicitations. The story of all this, and finally of the refusal to print in the pages of the Geological Journal the reclamations of the venerable and aggrieved author, make altogether a painful chapter, which will be found in the Philos. Magazine, for 1854 [IV, viii, pp. 301-317, 359-370, and 483-506] and more fully in the Synopsis of British Paleozoic Eocks, which forms the introduction to McCoy's British Paleozoic Fossils. In connection with this history it may be mentioned that in March, 1845, Sedgwick presented to the Geological Society a paper on the Comparative Classification of the Fossiliferous Bocks of North Wales and those of Cumberland, Westmoreland, and Lancashire ; which appears also in abstract in the same volume of the Geolou;ical Journal that contains the abstract of the essay and the map just referred to. [I, 442.] That this ab- stract also is made by another than the author is evident from such an expression as " the author's opinion seems to be grounded on the following facts, etc.,'' (p. 448) and from the manner in which the te.ms Lower and Upper Silurian are applied to certain fossiliferous rocks in Cumberland. Yet the words of this ab- stract are quoted with emphasis in Siluria [1st ed., 147] as if they were Sedgwick's own language recognizing Murchison's Silurian nomenclature. II. — Middle and Lower Cambrian. Investigations in continental Europe were, meanwhile, prepar- ing the way for anew chapter in the history of the lower paleozoic rocks. A series of sedimentary beds in Sweden and Norway had long been known to abound in singular petrifications, some of which had been examined by Linnaeus, who gave to them the name of EntomoUthi. They were also studied and described by Wahlenberg and by Brongniart, the latter of whom, from two varieties of the Eutomolithus paradoxus^ Linn, established in 1822 two genera, Paradoxldts and Agnostus. In 1826 ap- peared a memoir by Dalmao on the PalseadEe or so-called Trilo- No. 3.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 295 bites ; which was followed, in 1828, by his classic work on the same subject. [Uber de Palaeaden oder so-genanten Tiilobiten, 4to. with six plates, Leipsic] In these works were described and figured, among many others, two genera — Olenns, which included Paradoxides, Brongn, and Battus, including Agnosfus of the same author. Meanwhile, Hisinger was carefully studying the strata in which these trilobites were found in Gothland, and in the same year (1828) publi!^hed in his AnfecJcningar, or Notes on the Physical and Geognostical Structure of Norway and Sweden, a colored geological map and section of these rocks as they occur in the county of Skaraborg ; where three small cir- cumscribed areas of nearly horizontal fossiliferous strata are shown to rest upon a floor of old crystalline rocks, in some parts granitic and in others gneissic in character. The section and map, as given by Hisinger, show the succession in the principal area to be as follows, in ascending order : 1. granite or gneiss ; 2. sandstone; 3. alum-slates; 5. orthoceratite-limestones ; 4. clay- slates. By a curious oversight the colors on the legend are wrongly arranged and wrongly numbered, as above ; for in the map and section it is made clear that the succession is that just given, and that the clay-slates (4), instead of being below, are above the orthoceratite-limestones (5). In 1837, Hisinger published his great work on the organic remains of Sweden, entitled Lethoex Suecica [4to. with forty-two plates.] Ill this he gives a tabular view, in descending order, of the rock-formations, and of the various genera and species de- scribed. The rocks of the areas just noticed appear in his fourth or lowest division, under the head of Fomiat'tones transltionls, and are divided as follows : a. Strata calcarea rcccntiora Gottlandiaj. b. Strata schisti argillacci. c. Strata schisti aluminaris. d. Strata calcarea antiqiiiora. e. Strata saxi arenacci. The succession thus given was however erroneous, and pro- bably, like the mistake in the legend of the same author's map just mentioned, the result of inadvertence, the true position of the alum-slates (c) being between the older limestone {d) and the basal sandstone (e). This is shewn both by Hisinger's map of 1828, and by the testimony of subsequent observers. In Murchison's work on the Geology of Russia in Europe, publish- 29G THE CANADIAN NATURALIST, [Vol. vi ed in 1845, tliero is given (page 15 et seq.) an account of his visit to tliis region in company with Prof. Loven, of Christiania ; which, with figures of the sections, is reproduced in the different editions of Siluria. The hill of Kinnekulle on Lake Wener, is one of the three areas of transition rocks delineated on the map of Hisinger above referred to. Resting upon a flat region of nearly vertical gneissic strata, we have, according to Murchison : 1. a fucoidal sandstone; 2. alum-slates; 3. red orthoceratite • limestone ; 4. black graptolitic slates ; the whole series being little over 1000 feet in thickness, and capped by erupted green- stone. Above these higher slates there are found in some parts of Gothland, other limestones with orthoceratites, trilobites and corals, the newer limestone strata (a) of Hisinger ; the whole over- laid by thin sandstone beds. These' higher limestones and sand- stones contain the fiiuna of the Wenlock and Ludlow of Ens:- land ; while the lower limestones and graptolitic slates afford Calymene Blumenbachil, Orthis calUgramma, and many other species common to the Bala group of North "Wales. The alum- slates below these however, contained, according to Hisinger, none of the species then known in British rocks, but in their stead five species of Olenus and two of Battus (Agnostus.') In 1854, Angelin published his Palceontologica Scandinacica, part I, Crustacea format lonis transit lonis, [4to. forty-one plates} in which he divided the series of transition rocks above described by Hisinger into eight parts designated by Roman numerals,, counting from the base. Of these I was named Regio Fucoidariimy no organic remains other than fucoids being know therein ; while the remaining seven were named from their characteristic genera of trilobites, which were as follows, in ascending order ; certain letters being also used to designate the parts: II. (A) Olenus; III. (B) Conocoryphe ; IV. (BC) Ceratopyge; V. (C) Asaphus; VI. (D) Trinucleus; VII. (BE) Harpes; VIII. (E) Cryp- tonymus. In the Regio Olenorum (II) was found also the allied genus Faradoxides. With regard to the characteristic genus of Regio III., the name of Conocoryplie was proposed for it by Corda in 1847, as synonymous with Zenker's name of Co/iocfj^Zia- lus {Conocephalites^ already appropriated to a genus of insects. Meanwhile, the similar crustaceans which abound in the tran- sition rocks of Bohemia had been studied and described by Hawle, Corda and Beyrich, when Barrande began his admirable investigations of this ancient fauna and of its stratigraphical re- No. 3.3 HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 297 lations. He soon found that beneath the horizon characterized by fossils of the Bala group (Llandeilo and Caradoc) there ex- isted in Bohemia a series of strata distinguished by a remarkable fauna, entirely distinct from anything known in Great Britain, but closely allied to that of the alum-slates of Scandinavia, cor- responding to Begiones II. and III. of Angelin. To this he gave the name of the first or primordial fauna, and to the rocks yielding it that of the Primordial Zone. Besting upon the old gneisses of Bohemia appears a series of crystalline schists design- ated by Barrande as Etage A, overlaid by a series of sandstones and conglomerates, Etaye B, upon which repose the fossiliferous argillites of the primordial zone or Etage C. The rocks of the Etages A and B were by Barrande regarded as azoic, but in 1861, Fritsch of Prague, after a careful search, discovered in certain thin-bedded sandstones of B, the traces of fiUed-up ver- tical double tubes ; which, according to Salter, [Mem. Geol. Sur. III., 2-13] are probably the marks of annelides, and are identical with those found in the rocks of the Bangor or Longmynd group in Great Britain ; which will be shown to belong to the primordial zone. It is, therefore, probable that the Etage B, which appar- ently corresponds to the Regio Fucoidarum or basal sandstone of Scandinavia, should itself be included in the primordial zone. It may here be noticed that it is in the crystalline schists of A that Gumbel has found Eozoon Bavaricum. To the Etage C in Bohemia, Barrande assigns a thickness of about 1200 feet, and to this his first fauna is confined, while in the succeeding divisinos he distinguished a second and a third. The second f^iuna, which characterizes Etage D, corresponds to that of the B da group; while the third fauna, belonging to the Etages E, F, G and H, is that of the May Hill, Weulock and Ludlow formations of Great Britain. ■ This classification of the ancient Bohemian faunas was first set forth by Barrande in 1816, in his Notice Freliminaire, in which he declared that the first fauna was below the base of the Llan- deilo of Murchison, unknown in Great Britain, and, moreover, "new and independent in relation to the two Silurian faunas (his second and third) already established in England." This opinion he reiterated in 1859. These three divisions form in Bohemia an apparently continuous series, and being connected with each other by some common species, Barrande was led to look upon the whole as forming a single stratigraphical system ; 298 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. and finally to assert that these three independent faunas '-form by their union an indivisible triad which is the Silurian system." [Bui. Soc. Geol. de Fr. II, xvi, 529-545.] Already, in 1852, in his magnificent work on the Silurian System of Bohemia, Bar- rande had given to the strata characterized by his first fauna the name of Primordial Silurian. It is difiicult to assign any just reason for thus annexing to the Silurian, — already augment- ed by the whole Upper Cambrian or Bala group of Sedgwick, (Llandeilo and Caradoc) — a great series of fossiliferous rocks lying below the base of the Llandeilo, and unsuspected by the author of the Silurian system ; who persistently claimed the Llan- deilo beds, with their characteristic second fauna, as marking the dawn of organic life. Up to this time the primordial paleozoic fauna of Bohemia and of Scandinavia was, as we have said, unknown in Great Britain. The few org;inic remains mentioned by Sedgwick in 1835 as occurring in the region occupied by his Lower and Middle Cam- brian, on Snowdon, were found to belong to Bala beds, which there rest upon the older rocks: nor was it until 1845 that Mr. Davis found in the Middle Cambrian remains of Lingula. In 1846. Sedgwick, in company with Mr. Davis, re-examined these rocks, and in December of the same year described the Lingula- beds as overlaid by the Trcmadoc slates and occupying a well- defined horizon in Caernarvon and Merionethshire, beneath the great mass of the Upper Cambrian rocks. [Geol. Jour. II, 75, III, 139.] Sedgwick, at the same time, noticed about this horizon certain graptolites and an Asaphus, which were supposed to belong to the Tremadoc slates, but have since been declared by Salter to pertain to the Arenig or Lower Llandeilo beds, the base of the Upper Cambrian. [Mem. Geol. Sur. Ill, 257, and Decade II.] This discovery of the Lingula-flags, as they were then named, and the fixing by Sedgwick of their geological horizon, was at once followed by a cireful examination of them by the Govern- ment surveyors, and in 1847, Sclwyn detected in the Lingula- flags, near Dolgelly, in Merionethshire, the remains of two crustacean forms, the one a phyllopod, which has received the name of IJjjmenocaiis verm {can da. Salter, and the other a trilo- bite which was described by Salter in 1849 as Ohnus micrurus. [Geol. Survey, Decade IL] A species of Para doxides, apparently identical with P. ForMammeri of Sweden, was also about this No. 3.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 299 time recognized among specimens supposed to be from the same horizon. It has since been described as P. Hicksii, and found to belong to the basal beds of the Lingula flags, — the Menevian group. Upon the flanks of the Malvern Hills there are found resting upon the ancient crystalline rocks of the region, and overlaid by the Pentamerus beds of the May Hill sandstone (originally called Caradoc by Murchison) a series of fossiliferous beds. These consist in their lowest part of about 600 feet of greenish sandstone, -which have since yielded an OholtlJa and Serjndifes, and are overlaid by 500 feet of black schists. In these, in 1842, Prof. John Phillips found the remains of trilobites, which he sub- sequently described, in 1848, as three species of Olenus. [Mem. Geol. Survey II, part 1, 55.] These black shales, which had not at that time furnished any organic remains, were by Murchi- son in his SilurijD System (p. 416) in 1839 compared to the supposed passage-beds in Caermarthenshire between the Llan- deilo and the Cambrian (Bala) rocks; which, as we have seen, were newer and not older strata than the Llandeilo flaas. From their lithological characters, and their relations to the Pentamerus beds, these lower fossiliferous strata of Malvern were subsequently referred by the Government geologists to the hoi'izon of the Caradoc proper or Bala group; nor was it until 1851, that their true geological age and significance were made known. In that year, Barrande, fie^h from the study of the older rocks of the continent, came to England for the purpose of comparing the British fossils with those of the primordial zone, which he had established in Bohemia and Scandinavia, and which he at once recognized in the Lingula-flags of Sedgwick and in the black schists at Malvern ; both of which were characterized by the pre- sence of the genus Ohnus, and were referred to the horizon of his Etage C. This important conclusion was announced by Salter to the British Association at Belfast in 1852. [Hep. Brit. Assoc, abstracts, p. 56, and Bull. Soc. Geol. de Fr. II, xvi, 537.] Since that time the progress of investigation in the Middle and Lower Cambrian rocks of Wales has shown a fauna the impor- tance and richness of which has increased from year to year. The paleontological studies of Salter, while they confirmed the primordial character of the whole of the great mass of strata which make up the Middle Cambrian or Festiniog group of Sedg- wick, (consisting of the Lingula-flags and the Tremadoc slates,) 300 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST, [Vol. \i, led liim to propose several sub-divisions. Thus he distinguished on paleontological grounds between the upper and lower Tremadoo slates, and for like reasons divided the Lingula-flags into a lower and an upper portion. For the discussion of these distinctions the reader is referred to the memoirs of the Geol. Survey [III, 240-257.] Subsequent researches led to the division of the ori- ginal Lingula-flags into three parts, an upper and a middle, to which the names of Dolgelly and Maentwrog were given by Mr. Belt, and a third consisting of the basal beds, which .were se- parated in 1865, by Salter and Hicks, with the designation of Menevian, derived from the ancient Roman name of St. David's in Pembrokeshire. It was here that in 1862, Salter found Paradnxides with Agnostus and Lingula in fine black shales at the base of the Lingula-flags, resting comformably on the green and purple grits of the Lower Cambrian or Harlech beds. The locality was afterwards carefully studied by Hicks, and it was soon made apparent that the genus Paradoxides, both here and in North Wales, was confined to a horizon below the great mass of the Lingula-fligs ; which, on the contrary, are characterized by numerous species of Olenus. These lower or Menevian beds are hence regarded by Salter as equivalent to the lowest portion of the Eta2;e C of Barrande. Beneath these Menevian beds there lies, in apparent conformity, the great Lower Cambrian series, frequently called the bottom or basement rocks by the Government surveyors ; represented in North Wales by the Harlech grits, and in South Wales, near St. Davids, by a similar series of green and purple sandstones, considered by Murchison, and by others, as the equivalent of the Harlech rocks. They were still supposed to be unfossiliferous until in June, 1867, Salter and Hicks announced the discovery in the red beds of this lower series, at St. Davids, of a Lingulella, very like L.ferruginea of the Menevian. [Geol. Jour. XXIII, 339 ; Siluria 4th ed. 550.] This led to a farther examination of these Lower Cambrian beds, which has resulted in the dis- covery in them of a fauna distinctly primordial in type, and linked by the presence of several identical fossils to the Menevian ; but in many respects distinct, and marking a lower fossiliferous horizon than anything known in Bohemia or in Scandinavia. The first announcement of these important results was ra ide to the British Association at Norwich in 1868. Further details were, however, laid before the Geolo2ical Society in May, 1871, No. 3.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 301 by Messrs. Harkness and Hicks, whose paper on the Ancient Rocks of St. David's Promontory appears in the Geological Journal for November, 1871. [XXVIII, 384.] The Cam- brian sediments here rest upon an older series of crystalline stra- tified rocks, described by the geological surveyors as syenite and greenstone, and having a north-west strike. Lying unconformably upon these, and with a north-east strike, we have the following- series, in ascending order : 1. quartzosc conglomerate, 60 feet ; 2. greenish flaggy sandstones, 460 feet; 3. red fl.igs or slaty beds, 50 feet, containing Ling nlella ferruginea^ besides a larger species, Discuia, and LepercUtia Camhrensis ; 4. purple and greenish sandstones, 1000 feet; 5. yellowish gray sandstones, fl igs and shales, 150 feet, with Plutonia, Conoconjphe^ Mlcrodiscus, Agnosfiis, Theca and Protospongia ; 6. gray, purple and red flaggy sandstones, with most of the above genera, 1500 feet; 7. gray fliggy beds, 150 feet, with Paradoxides; 8. true Menevian beds, richly fossil iferous, 500 feet. The latter are the probable equivalent of the base of Barrande's Etage C, and at St. David's are conformably overlaid by the Lingula-flags ; beneath which we have, including the Menevian, a conformable series of 3370 feet of uncrystalline sediments, fossiliferous nearly to the base, and holding a well-marked fauna distinct from anything hitherto known in Great Britain or elsewhere. The Menevian beds are connected with the underlying strata by the presence of Lingidella ferrugiuea, Disclna pileolus, and OholeUa sngittatis, which extend through the whole series ; and also by the genus Paradoxides, four species of which occur in these lower strata ; from which the genus Olenua, which charac- terizes the Lino-ula-flao-s. seems to be absent. To a large tuber- culated trilobite of a new genus found in these lowest rocks the name of Plutonia Sedgwickii has been given. Hicks has proposed to unite the Menevian with the Harlech beds, and to make the summit of the former the dividing line between the Ijower and Middle Cambrian, a suggestion which has been' adopted by Lyell. [Proc. Brit. Assoc, for 1868, p. 68, and Lyell, Student's Manual of Geology, 466-469.] Both Phillips and Lyell give the name of Upper Cambrian to the Lingula-flags and the Tremadoc slates, which together constitute the Middle Cambrian of Sedn-wick, and concede the title of Lower Silurian to the Bala group or Upper Cambrian of Sedgwick. The same view is adopted by Linnarsson ia 302 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. Sweden, who places the line between Cambrian and Silurian at the base of the Llandeilo or the second fauna. It was by following these authorities that I, inadvertently, in my address to the Amsrican Association for tlie Advancement of Science in August, 1871, gave this horizon as the original division between Cambrian and Silurian. The reader of the first part of this paper will see with how much justice Sedgwick claims for the Cambrian the whole of the fossiliferous rocks of Wales beneath the base of the May Hill sandstone, including both the first and the second fauna. I cannot but agree with the late Henry Darwin Rogers, who, in 1856, reserved the designation of " the true Euro- pean Silurian " for the rocks above this horizon. [Keith Johnson's Physical Atlas, 2nd ed.] The Lingul i-fl igs and Trcmadoc slates have been made the subject of careful stratigraphical and paleontological studies by the Geologic il Survey, the results of which are set forth by E- imsay and Salter in the third volume of the Memoirs of the Geological Survey, published in 1866, and also, more concisely, in the Anniversary Address by the former to the Geological Society in 1863. [Geol. Jour. XIX, xviii.] The Lingula flags (with the underlying Menevian, which resembles them lithologically) rest in apparent conformity upon the purple Harlech rocks both in Pembrokeshire and in Merionethshire, where the latter appear on the great Merioneth anticlinal, long since pointed out by Sedg- wick. The Lingula-fl igs, (including the Menevian) have in this region, according to Ramsay, a thickness of about 6000 feet. Above these, near Tremadoc and Festiniog, lie the Tremadoc slates, which are hero overlaid, in apparent conformity, by the Lower Llandeilo beds. At a distance of eleven miles to the north-west, however, the Tremadoc slates disappear, and the Lingula-flags are represented by only 2,000 feet of strata 5 while in parts of Caernarvonshire, and in Anglesea, the whole of the Lingula-flags and moreover the Lower Cambrian rocks, are ■wanting, and the Llandeilo beds rest directly upon the ancient crystalline schists. In Scotland and in Ireland, moreover, the Lingula-flags, are wholly absent, and the Llandeilo rocks there repose unconformably upon grits regarded as of Lower Cambrian age. Thus, without counting the Tremadoc slates, which are a local formation, unknown out of Merionethshire, we have (includ- ing the Bangor group and Lingula-flags,) beneath the Llandeilo, over 9,0U0feet of fossiliferous strata, which disappear entirely in No. 3.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 303 the distance of a few miles. From a careful survey of all the facts, the conclusion of Ramsay is irresistible, that there exists between the Lingula-flags and the Llandeilo not merely one, but two great stratigraphical breaks in the succession ; the one between the Lingula-flags and the Lower Tremadoc slates, and the other between the Upper Tremadoc slates and the Lower Llandeilo. This conclusion is confirmed by the fact that there exists at each of these horizons a nearly complete paleontological break. The fauna of the Tremadoc slates is, according to Salter, almost en- tirely distinct from that of the Lingula-fl;igs, and not less distinct from that of the so-called Lower Llandeilo or Arenig rocks, (the equivalents of the Skiddaw slates of Cumberland). Hence, says Ramsay, it is evident " that in these strata we have three per- fectly distinct zones of organic remains, and therefore, in com- mon terms, three distinct formations." The paleontological evidence is thus in complete accordance with that furnished by stratigraphy. "We cannot leave this topic without citing the conclusion of Ramsay that " each of these two breaks necessarily implies a lost epoch, stratigraphically quite unrepresented in our area ; the life of which is only feebly represented in some cases by the fossils common to the underlying and overlying forma- tion." In connection with this remark, which we conceive to embody a truth of wide application, it may be said that strati- graphical breaks and discordances in a geological series, may, d priori, be expected to occur most frequently in regions where this series is represented by a large thickness of strata. The ac- cumulation of such masses implies great movements of subsi- dence, which, in their nature, are limited, and are accompanied by elevations in adjacent areas, from which may result, over these areas, either interruptions in the process of sedimentation, or the removal, by sub-aerial or sub-marine denudation, of the sediments already formed. The conditions of succession and distribution it may be conceived, would be very difl'erent in a region where the period corresponding to this same geological series was marked by comparatively small accumulations of sediment upon an ocean- floor subjected to no great movements. This contrast is strikingly seen between the conformable series of less than 2,000 feet of strata which in Scandinavia are char- acterized by the first three paleozoic faunas (Cambrian and Si- lurian) and the repeatedly broken and discordant succession of 304 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. more than 30,000 feet of sediments,^ which in Wales are their paleontological equivalents. It must, however, be considered that in regions of small accumulation where, as in Scandinavia, the formations are thin, there may be lost or unrepresented zoolo- gical epochs whose place in the series is marked by no strati- graphical break. In such comparatively stable regions, move- ments of the surface sufficient to cause the exclusion, or the dis- appearance by removal, of the small thickness of strata corres- ponding to an epoch, may take place without any conspicuous marks of stratigraphical discordance. The attempt to establish geological divisions or horizons upon stratigraphical or paleontological breaks must always prove falla- cious. From the nature of things, these, whether due to non-de position or to subsequent removal of deposits, must be local ; and we can say, confidently, that there exists no break in life or in sedi- mentation which is not somewhere filled up and represented by a continuous and conformable succession. While we may define one period as characterized by the presence of a certain fauna, which, in a succeeding epoch, is replaced by a difierent one, there will always be found, in some part of their geographical distribution, a region where the two faunas commingle, and where the gradual disappearance of the old before the new may be studied. The division of our stratified rocks into systems is therefore unphi- losophical, if we assign any definite or precise boundaries or limi- tations to these. It was long since said by Sedgwick with regard to the whole succession of life through geologic time, • — that all belongs to one great systems natures. [Philos. Mag. IV. viii, 359] We have already noticed that Barrande, as early as 1852, gave the name of Primordial Silurian to the rocks which, in Bohemia, were marked by the first fauna ; although he, at the * The Longm5-nd rocks in Shropshire are alone estimated at 20,000 feet ; hut their supposed equivalents, the Harlech rocks of Pemhroke- shire, have a measured thickness of 3,300, while the Llanberris and Harlech rocks together, in North Wales, equal from 4,000 to 7,000 feet, and the Lingula-flags and Tremadoc slates, united, about 7,000 feet. The Bala group m the Berwyns exceeds 12,000 feet, and the proper Silurian, from the base of the Upper Llandovery or May Hill sandstone, attains from 5,000 to 6,000 feet ; so that the aggregate of 30,000 feet may be considered below the truth, [Mem. Geol. Surrey, III, part 2, pages 72, 222, and Siluria, 4th ed. 185.] No. 3.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 305 same time, rccoirnized this as distinct from and older than the second fauna, discovered in theLhindeilo rocks, which Murchison had dcchired to represent the dawn of organic life. Into the reasons which led Barrande to include the rocks of the first, second and third faunas in one Silurian system, (a view which was at once adopted by the British Geological Survey and by Murchison himself.) it is not our province to inquire, but we desire to call attention to the fact that the latter, by his own principles, was bound to reject such a classification. In his address before the Geological Society in 1842, (already quoted in the first part of this paper,) he declared that the discussion as to the value of the term Cambrian involved the question "whether there was any type of fossils in the mass of the Cambrian rocks diff"erent from those of the Lower Silurian series. If the appeal to nature should be answered in the negative, then it was clear that the Lower Silurian type mut^t be considered the true base of what I had named the protozoic rocks ; but if characteristic new forms were discovered, then would the Cambrian rocks, whose place was so well est:iblished in the dcf-cending series, have also their own fauna, and the paleozoic base would necessarily be removed to a lower horizon." In the event of no distinct fauna being found in the Cambrian series, it was declared that *' the term Cambrian must cease to be used in zonlogic il classification, it bt'ing, in that eense, synony- mous with Lower Silurian/' [Proc. Geol. Soc. Ill, 641 et ^^eq.] That such had been the result of paleontological inquiiy Mur- chison then proceeded to show. Inasmuch as the only portion of Sedgwick's Cambrian which was then known to be fossiliferous, was re illy above and not bjlovv the LLmduilo rocks, which Mur- chis^On had taken for the base of his LoVer Silurian, his reason- ing with regard to the Cambrian nomenclature, based on a false datum, Was itself fallacious ; and it might have been expected that when the government surveyors had shown his stratigraphical error, Murchison would have lendertd justice to the nonjenclature of Sedgwick, But when, still later, a f..rther ";.ppe..l to nature" led to the discovery of " characteristic new foims," and estab- lished the existince of a " type of fossils in the mas? of the Cc.m- brian rocks, different f)om those of the J^ower Siluri.m series," Murchison was bound by his own principlcfi to recognize the name of Cambrian for the great Fystiniog' group, with its primordial Vol. VI. M No. 3. 306 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. * [Yol. vi. fauna, even though Barrande and the government surveyors shouki unite in calling it Primordial Silurian. He however chose the opposite course, and now attempted to claim for the Silurian system the whole of the Middle Cambrian or Festiniog group of Sedgwick, including the Tremadoc slates and the Lingula-flags. The grounds of this assumption, as set forth in the successive editions of Siluria from 1854 to 1867, and in various memoirs, may be included under three heads : first that the Lingula-flags have been found to exist in some parts of his original Silurian region ; second, that no clearly-defined base had been assigned by him to his so-called system ; and third, that there are no means of drawing a line of demarkation between these Middle Cambrian formations and the overlying Llandeilo. With regard to the first of these reasons, it is to be said that the only known representatives of the Lingula-flags in the region described by Murchison in his Silurian System are the black slates of Malvern ; and some scanty outliers which, in Shropshire, lie between the old Longmynd rocks and the base of the Stiper* Stones. The former were then (as has already been shown) sup- posed by him to belong to the Llandeilo, or rather to the passage- beds between the Llandeilo and Cambrian (Bala) ; while with regard to the latter, Ramsay expressly tells us that they were not originally classed with the Silurian, but have since been included in it. [Mem. Geol. Sur. Ill, part 2, page 9 ; and 242, foot-note.] The Llandeilo beds were by Murchison distinctly stated to be the base of the Silurian system [Sil. Sys. 222.] ; and it was far- ther declared by him that in Shropshire; (unlike Caermartheo- shire,) " there is no p .ssage from the Cambrian to the Silurian strata," but a hiatus, marked by disturbances which excluded the passage-beds, and caused the Lower Silurian to rest unconform- ably upon the Longmynd rocks. [Ibid, 256; and plates 31, sec- tions 3 and 6; 32, section 4.] But in Siluria [1st. ed. 47] the two are stated to be conformable; and in the subsequent sections of this region, made by Aveline, and published by the Geological Survey, the evidences of this want of conformity do not appear^ Murchison at that time confounded the rocks of the Longmynd with the Cambrian (Bala) beds of Caermarthenshire and Brecon, [Sil. Sys. 416.] Hence it was that he gave the name of Cam- brian to the former; and this mistake, moreover, led him to place the Cambrian of Caermarthenshire beneath the Llandeilo. It is clear that if he claimed no well-defined base to the Llandeilo No. 3.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 307 rocks in this latter (their typical region), it was because he saw them passing into the overlying Bala beds. There was, in the error by which he placed below the Llandeilo, strata which were really above them, no ground whatever for afterwards including in his Silurian system, as a downward continuation of the Llan- deilo rocks (which are the basal portion of the Bala group), the whole Festiniog group of Sedgwick; whose infra-position to the Bala had been shown by the latter long before it was known to be fossiliferous. It was however claimed by Murchison that no line of separa- tion can be drawn between these two groups. The results of Ramsay and of Salter, as set forth in the address of the former before the Geological Society in 1863, and more fully in the Memoirs of the Geological Survey [vol. III. part 2] published in 1866, with a preface by himself, as the director of the Survey, are completely ignored by Murchison. The reader familiar with these results, of which we have given a summary, finds with sur- prise that in the last edition of Sihn-ia, that of 1867, they are noticed in part, but only to be repudiated. In the five pages of text which are there given to this great Middle C-nnbrian divi- sion, we are told that the distinction between the Lower Trema- doc and the Linouhi-fl isrs '' is difficult to be drawn," and that the Upper Tremadoc slate passes into and forms the lower part of the Llandeilo, " into which it graduates conform. .bly." (Siluria, 4th ed. p. 46.) In each of these cases, on the contrary, according to RaraSiiy, there is observed " a break very nearly complete both in gener.i and species, and prob .ble unconformity;" the evidence of the p ileontologic .1 break being fuinished by the careful studie8 of Salter; while that of the stratigraphic.d break, as we have seen, leaves no reason for doubt. [Mem. Geol. Sur. Ill, part 2, p; ges 2, 161, 234.] The student of Slhiria soon learns that in all cases where Murchison's pretensions were concerned, the book is only calculated to mL-iJead, The reader of this history will now be able to understind why, botwithstanding the support given by B arrande, by the Geologi- cal Survey of Great Britain, and by most American geologists to the Silurian nomenclature of Murchison, it is rejected, so f >r as the Lingula-fligs and the Tremadoc si ites are concerned, by Lyell) Phillips, Dividson, Harknesa and Hicks in England, and by Linnarsson in Sweden. These authorities have, however, admitted the name of Lower Silurian for the Bala group or o 08 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Yol. VI. Upper Cambrinn of Sedgwick ; a concession whicli can hardly be defended, but which apparently found its way into use at a time when the yet unravelled perplexities of the Welsh rocks led Sedgwick himself to propose, for a time, the name of Cambro- Silurian for the Bala group. This want of agreement among geologists as to the nomenclature of the lower paleozoic rocks, causes no little confusion to the learner. AVe have seen that Henry Darwin Roirers followed Seduwick in Giving; the name of Cambrian to the whole paleozoic series up to the base of the May Hill sandstone; and the same view is adopted by Woodward in his M inu il of the Mollusca. The student of this excellent book will find that in the tables eivinji' the j>eolo£iical ranoe of the mollusca, on pages 124, 125 and 127, the name of Cambrian is used in Seduwick's sense, as includina' all the fossiliferous strata beneath the May Hill sandstone. On page 123 it is however explained that Lower Silurian is a synonjm for Cambrian, and it is so used in the body of the work. The distribution of the Lower and Middle Cambrian rocks in Great Britain may now be noticed. The former, or Bangor group, to which Murcliison and the Geological Survey restrict the name cf Cambrian, and which they sometimes call the Longmynd, bottom or basement rocks, occupy two adjacent areas in Caernar- von and Merionethshire; the one near Baniior, includin2: Llan- berris, to the uoith-east, and the other, including Harlech and B irmouth, to the south-east of Snowdon ; this mountain lying in a synclin;-l between them, and rising 3571 feet jibove the tea. The great mass of grits or sandstones appears to be at the summit of the group, but in the lower part the blue roofing-slates of Llan- beiris are interstratified in a series of green and purple slates, grits and conglomerates. (Some of the Welsh roofing-slates are hovN'Gver supposed to belong to the Llandeilo). [Mem. Geol. Survey III, part 2, pages 54, 258.] The Harlech rocks in this north-western region are conformably overlaid by the Mcnevian, followed by the true Lingula-flag?*, or Olenus beds, of the Middle Ci.mbiian. I'^pon these repose the Trcmadoc slates, which are not known in the other parts of Wales. Tlie third area of Lower Cambrian rocks is that already described at St. David's in Pem- brokeshire, about 100 miles to the south-west; and the fourth, that of the Longmynd hills, about sixty miles to the south-east of Snowdon. The rocks of the Longmynd, like those of the other Lower Cambrian areas mentioned, consist principally of No, 3.] HUNT— ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 309 green and purple sandstones with conglomerates, shales and some clay-slates. They occasionally hold flakes of anthracite, and small portions of mineral pitch exude from them in f-ome local- ities. The only evidence of animal life yet found in the rocks of the Longmynd are furnished by worm-burrows, the obscure re- miins of a crustacean, (the P doenpijge Rnnmi/}\) and a form like Hlstioderma. This latter organic reiic, with worm-burrows, and the fossils named Oldhamifi, is found on the coast of Ireland opposite Caernarvonshire, in the rocks of Bray Head ; which resemble lithologically the Harlech beds, and are regarded as their equivalents. Still another area of the older rocks is that of the Malverji hills, on the western flanks of \^hich, as already mentioned, the Lingula-fl.igs are represented by about 500 feet of black shales with Olenus, underlaid by 600 feet of greenish sandstones con- taining traces of fucoids, with Serpulites and an Obolella. It is not iniprob:ible, as suggested by Barrande and by jMurchison, that these 1100 feet of strata represent, in this region, the great mass of the Lingula-fligs, — and, we may add, perhaps the whole series of Lower C mbrian strata, which in Caernarvonshire and Pembrokeshire underlie them ; since these sandstones of M>.lvern, like those of St. David's, rest upon crystalline schists, and are iu part made up of their ruins. These crystalline schists of Malvern, which are described by Phillips as the oldest rocks in England, and by Mr. HoU are con- jectured to be Luurontian, seem from the descriptions of their lithological characters to resemble those of Caernarvon and Ang- Icsea, with which they are, by Murchison, regarded as identical. The crystalline schists of these latter localities are, by Sedgwick, described as hypozoic strata, below the base of the C imbrian. Murchison however, in the first edition of his Siluria, adopted the suggestion of Dj la Beche that they themselves were altered Cambrian strata. In fact they directly underlie the Llandeilo rocks, and were apparently conceived by Murchison to represent the downward continuation of these, upon which he had insisted. This opinion is supported by ingenious arguments on the part of Ramsay. [Mem. Geol. Survey, III, part 2, passim.] I am however disposed to regard them, with Sedgwick and Phillips, as of pre-Cambrian age, and to compare them with the Huronian series of North America, which occupies a similar geological hori;zon, and with which, as seen iu northern Michigan, and in the 310 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. Green Mountains, I have found the rocks of Anglesea to offer remarkable lithological resemblances. It may here be noticed that the gold-bearing quartz veins in North Wales are found in the Menevian beds, and also, according to Selvvjn, throughout the Lingula-flags. These fossiliferous strata at the gold-mine near Dolgelly appear in direct contact with diorites and chloritic and talcose schists, which ure more or less cupriferous, and themselves also contain gold-bearing quartz veins. [Mem. Geol. Survey, part 2, pp. 42 ; 45, and Siluria, 4th ed., 450, 547.] The Table on page 312 gives a view of the lower paleozoic rocka of Great Britain and North America, together with the various nomenclatures and classifications referred to in the preceding pages. In the second column, the horizontal black lines indicate the positions of the thve'e important paleontologic il and strati- graphical breaks signalized by Ramsay in the British succession. [xMem. Gtol. Survey, III, part 2, page 2.] In a table by D ividson in the Ge.ologicnl Mugnzlne for 1868 [V. 305] showing the distribution of organic remains in these lower rocks, he gives, as the Festiniog group of Sedgwick, only the Dolgelly and Maent- wrog beds of Belt (the Upper and Middle Lingula-flags); and makes of the two divisions of the Tremadoc rocks a separate group ; the whole being described as the Upper Cambrian of Sedg- wick. This however is not the present grouping and nomencla- ture of Sedgwick, nor was it his earlier one. So far as regards Mid- dle and Upper Cambrian, this discrepancy is explained by the fact already stated, that in 1843 Sedgwick proposed, as a compromise, the name of Cambro-Silurian for his B da group, previously called Upper Cambrian ; by which change the Festiniog or Middle Cam- brian became Upper Cambrian. When the true relation between the Lower Silurian of Murchison and the Bala group was made known, Sedgwick, as we have seen, re-claimed for the latter his former name of Upper Cambrian ; but this had meanwhile been adopted for the Festiniog group, in which sense it is still used by Lyell, Phillips, Davidson, Harkness and Hicks. The Festiniog group, or Middle Cambrian, as defined by Sedgwick, however, included not only the whole of the Lingula-flags but the Upper and Lower Tremadoc rocks. [Philos. Mag. IV. viii. 362.] The only change which I have made in the groupings of the British rocks adopted by Sedgwick and by Murchison, is in sepa- rating the Menevian or Lower Lingula-flags from the Festiniog, No. 3.] HUNT— ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 311, and unitirtg it with the Bangor group or Lower Cambrian. In this I follow, with Lyell and Davidson, the suggestion of Salter and Hicks. In the third column, the sub-divisions are those of the New York and Canada Geological Surveys; in connection with which the reader is referred to a table published in 1863, in the Geohgn of Canado^ page 932. Opposite the Menevian I have placed the n-ames of its principal American localities; which are Braintree, Mass., St. John, New Brunswick, and St. John's, New- foundland. The farther consideration of the Americ.m sub- divisions is reserved for the third part of this paper. With re- gard to the classific ition of Angelin, it is to be rcmirked that although he designates II as Regio Olenorum, and III as Regio Conocorypli'irum. the position of these, according to Linnarsi^on, is to be reversed ; the Conocoryphe beds with Paradoxides being below and not above those holding Olenus. The Regio Fucoid- arum in Sweden has lately furnished a brachiopodous shell, Lingula monillfera, besides the curious plant-like fossil, Eoplnj- ton Linnceanum. [Linnarsson, Geol. Magazine, 1869, vi. 393.] (The third and concluding part of this paper will appear in the next number of the Natara,list.) 312 THE CANAPUN NATURALIST, [Vol. VI. o w H C3 C C D C w o c 1^ o N O •-3 < O ^ to Co e -2^ <4; ■^. :i 3 «9 «0 *^ *^ O ^ s> H > c W T^ u /—• h- 1 Pi cJ > c W Pi o ^ ^ -c .2 ^ c "^ - - "^ ^ a Pi p fe tj: — ^^ S xf • t+i ^ " g ^ cS '-' ~ 'VI (£ o c F^ eS ce fee - t- • ■*— • j:0^-pq w ' ^ :;j ^ - Ci ^ tl ■c -^ ce -^ S- u O -t- ^ HJ C cw £.a (1h eC c •- t C i^"^ X — c - £.02 ^ e:^ O S x^ • ^ :*" O ^ O ~ ^1 « lip r V- -^ »- ji & c c c -S te X > — t; Z ^ > tC c 5 2 or P O ^;z,s Sr^pQC) — 6 S c o ►-5 OJ o > c O ^ 2. h3 c _c c c £ £ O ii. c ' ~ c he . c 1^ ■Ti ll 7 ll 8 ll 9 ll 10 ll 11 ll 12 571 12 midnight . • noon 2 4 p.m 6 ll 8 ll 9 ll ■ 9=0 - 909 -lOol -1203 -13°1 -I60O -I804 -1107 -1303 -I607 -I80O -2000 -2101 -2109 -2201 -2203 -2302 -I406 -1304 -1009 • 900 ■ 900 . 900 25ih January, 1871. 10 p.m — 1402 12 midnight . . . . — 1600 26^^ January, 1871. 2 a.m. 4 " —1701 —1903 —2207 —2200 —2100 —1701 — 15°1 27^A — 10°6 — 8°0 — 700 .— 6^6 Janu dry, 2 p.m 4 " —1400 — 1402 6 " 6 " .... — 1503 7 " 8 " — 1306 8 " 9 " — i-:o4 10 " 10 " —1100 12 noon 2 a.m. 4 « 12 midnight 1871. 8 a.m 10 " — IG02 — 600 . . . . — 303 6 « 12.40" ...,_« 000 7 " No. 3.] SMALLWOOD — METEOROLOGY. 337 The second cold term occurred on the 4th of February and attained a temperature of — 28°. The Thermometer was 52^ 45™ below zero. The following table contains a record of the observations : 4th February, 1871. 12.15 a.m. 1 " 2 » 4 " 6 « 7 " — 0°0 — 2°1 — 8°0 — 11°G — 15°0 — 14°1 — 13°0 — 12°0 — 8°0 — 4°0 5th Febru —2207 —2602 — 28O0 — 2T°1 — 25°1 —2203 — 19°2 — 17°0 9°2 — 5^3 6th Febru — 10°4 — 10<^0 900 — 8°0 2 p.m. 2 40" 4 " 6 " 8 " 9 " 10 " 11 " 12 midn 1871. 2 p.m. 3 " 4 " 5 " 6 " 8 " 9 " 10 " 11 " 12 midn 1871. 8 a.m. 9 <' 10 " 11 '' • • • • • . ..•— 5°2 ..— 0°0 ...— 8°0 . ..— 906 ...—1204 ... 13°4 8 " ... 15°2 9 " ... 16°3 10 " 12 noon . 2 a.m. . 4 " ight . ...—2006 . ..— 201 ...— 104 6 " 7 " 8 " . ..— 509 . ..— 700 8°0 9 <• ... 11°4 10 " . ..— 1200 11 " ...—1202 12 noon . ..,_lloo 1 p.m. . 2 a.m. . 4 " . 6 " iglit . ...—1100 ...— 707 ..— 6°0 . . . — 400 7 '' . ...— 000 The third cold term of the 21st December set in with some- what unusual rapidity. The early part of the evening was bright and moonlight, with but light wind from the N. W. The Ther- mometer attained its zero point at 8.5 p.m. and at 9 p.m. stood at — 1*^6. Wind N. W.; velocity 4 miles per hour. Barometer 29.632. At midnight the wind freshened and veered to the W., velocity 12 miles per hour, the Barometer slowly rising, and at 11.49 p.m. (one of the signal hours of the War Department at Washington) it stood at — 5°5 ; at 2 a.m. it stood at — 10°6 ; and from that time it fell rapidly and attained a minimum of — 22^9. The Thermometer was 34^ below zero. Vol. VI. No. 3. 338 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. yi. Below is a table of the observations recorded 2lst December, 1871. 8.05 p.m — QoO 9 '< V • « • • • ...— 1°6 12 midnight . ...— 5°5 2 a.m ...— 10°6 4 " ... — 18°4 6 " ...—2209 7 " ...—2204 8 " . ..—2100 9 " . ..— 18°4 22nc? 2 a.m ...— 5°1 4 " . . . — 3°4 12 noon ..— 800 1 p.m . ..— 501 2 '' ..— 2°2 4 " ...— 12°2 6 " ..— 12°4 8 '' ...—12=6 9 " ..— 12°9 10 " ..— 12°0 12 midnight . . ..—IQoo 871. • 6 a.m ...— 1°0 7 " ..— 0°0 22nd December, 1871 The following table has been compiled to show the number of days in each month on which rain or snow fell, also the number of days without either rain or snow. Months, Days of Rain. Accompanied with Thunder and Lightning Days of Snow. Days without Rain or Snow. January February .... March April May June July August September .. . October November . . . December . . . 5 5 8 13 10 13 18 11 7 10 6 3 • • « • 1 3 5 8 1 • • ' • • 1 1 2 2 0 4 1 8 1 14 13 19 17 21 17 13 20 23 20 16 7 Total.... 109 18 56 200 Rain fell on 109 days ; it amounted to 26.507 inches, was accompanied by thunder and lightning in 18 days, and shows a large decrease in the usual annual rain fall. Snow fell on 56 days, amounting to 74.53 inches on the sur- face, which is equivalent to about 7.450 inches of rain. The first snow of autumn fell on the 18th October, and the winter fairly set in on the 29th November, with unusual severity, and somewhat earlier than the usual period, causing severe losses to shipping from foreign ports as also to the river navigation. The Thermometer first attained its zero point on the 29th November, No. 3.] SMALL WOOD — METEOROLOGY. 339 The ice left the froat of the city on the 8th of April, and the first steamer arrived in port on the 10th day. The last frost of spring was on the 2Gth of April. Winds. — The most prevalent wind during the year was the West, the next in frequency the N. E. The most windy month in the year was May, and the least winuy month July. Below is a table showing the direction of the wind for each month and its mean velocity in miles^ irrespective of its direction : Months. January , . February.. March. . , . April May June July August .. . September October . . November December N NE E 0 61 0 3 9 0 0 26 0 1 22 0 0 39 0 0 20 0 0 17» 2 0 23 0 4 5 1 2 13 1 12 19 2 0 13 0 SE S SW 6 W 19 NW 5 Calm. 0 0 0 0 0 19 52 1 0 5 4 7 38 7 6 5 3 14 43 0 2 3 0 12 36 0 1 0 3 13 54 0 0 1 0 16 54 2 1 0 9 10 46 5 0 0 14 7 53 5 1 2 12 23 34 6 0 6 5 0 41 4 1 1 0 23 48 7 1 Veloc'y 4.82 5.77 2.86 5.04 6.89 1.84 1.84 4.55 4.34 4.07 3.84 4.84 Mean monthly amount of clouds in decimals, a cloudy sky being represented by a whole number (1.00.) Months. Amoimt, 3fonths, Amount. January February March 0.40 0.30 0.40 0.50 0.30 0.30 July 0.40 Ausfust 0.30 September October 0.30 April 0 60 May November December 0.60 June , 0.70 There were 138 nights suitable for astronomical purposes dur- ing the year. The aurora borealis was visible at observation hours on 26 nights, and exhibited some grand displays on the 10th and 11th of February, 17th March, 9th of April, 7th of August, 7th of September and the 9th of November. Montreal Observatory, 30th Jan., 1872. 340 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Session 1871-72. MONTHLY MEETINGS. 1st Monthly Meeting, October 30th, 1871, — Principal Dawson presiding. A donation of a large collection of fossils from Sir G. Duncan Gibb, Bart., M.A., M.D., F.G.S., &c., &c., having been announced by the Kecording Secretary, a special vote of thanke to the donor was passed. Prof. J. B. Edwards made a communication on an insect larva (?) which he stated perforated filters made of silicated carbon. Mr. J. F. "Whiteaves read a paper entitled " Log of a Deep- Sea Dredo-inoj Cruise round the Island of Anticosti." This forms the first part of a report submitted by the author to the Hon. the Minister of Marine and Fisheries for publication, the whole of which it is hoped will appear, with the writer's latest corrections, in an early number of this journal. A paper by Dr. Anderson, entitled " The Whale of the St. Lawrence," was read by the Rec. Secretary. This will be found at pages 203-208 of the present volume. The following resolutions having been moved by Dr. Smallwood and seconded by G. L. Marler, were unanimously adopted : " That this Society desires to convey to the Hon. the Minister of Marine its grateful acknowledgments for the aid afforded to its Scien- tific Curator in the prosecution of his researches into the fauna of the deeper parts of the Gulf of St. Lawrence during the past summer, and to express i^s confidence that the results will be found to be useful and creditable to Canada, both in a practical and scientific point of view, and such as to encouraare a continuation and extension of simi- lar investigations." " That this resolution be communicated to the Hon. the Minister of Marine, with the assurance that the Society will do all in its power to enable the important scientific results of the expedition to be work- ed out, and published as extensively as possible." A copy of the above resolutions was duly forwarded to the Hon. Mr. Mitchell, to which the following reply was returned : No. 3.] NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY. 341 Ottawa, Nov. 25, 1871. Sir, — I have to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 3rd instant, informing me that at a meeting of the Natural History Society of Montreal, held on the 30th September last, a resolution of thanks was unanimously carried to myself, for the aid which I had afforded the Scientific Curator of the Society in the prosecution of his researches into the fauna of the deeper parts of the St. Lawrence Gulf during the past summer, and I am gratified to find in the second reso- lution that the Society have confidence '< that the results will be found to be useful and creditable to Canada, both in a practical and scienti- fic point of view, and such as to encourage a continuation and exten- sion of similar inA'cstigations." I am gratified also to learn that it is the intention of tho Society to '< do all in its power to enable the im- portant scientific results of the expedition to be worked out and pub- lished as extensively as possible." While this action of the Natural History Society is personally very gratifying to me, it is also satisfactory to me to be able to state that the Government, in granting the facilities which your Society asked for during the past season, performed an act which, I believe, com- mended itself to the intelligence of the country, and I have no doubt that the action of the researches of the Society in the future, directed as they are by intelligence and scientific skill, will always command the use of similar facilities such as those referred to at the command of the Government. It will afford me much pleasure to notice the result of your labours, if furnished therewith, in the annual report of my Department. I have the honor to be, Yours, &c,, P. Mitchell. J. F. Whiteaves, Esq , F.G.S., Montreal. 2nd Montlily Meeting, Nov. 29th, 1871. The Most R,ev. the Bishop of Montreal and Metropolitan, Rev. Charles Chapman, M.A., Drs. Eneas, Leprohon, Wilkins and McEachran, and Messrs. T. Wright, W. S. Walker, Alex- ander Robertson, Thomas Curry, S. B. Scott, H. Mott, N. Mer. cer, F. W. Hicks, M.A., and J. Dey, B.A., were elected Members of the Society. Prof. Nicholson's paper *' On the Colonies of M. Barrandc," was presented ; and Mr. Billings gave a popular exposition of Prof. Barrande's views. The article referred to will be found on page 188. Dr. T. Sterry Hunt then made a communication " On the Geological Structure of Mont Blanc," An article on this subject, by Dr. Hunt, entitled " On Arctic Geology," will be found in the American Journal of Science and Arts, for January, 1872. 3i2 - THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi, 3rd Monthly Meeting, Jan. 29th, 1872. The Secretary announced a donation of more than 120 volumes of the Zoological Catalogues of the British Museum, from the Trustees of that Institution, to whom a special vote of thanks was unanimously voted. Prof G. F. Armstrong, M.A., F.G.S., and Dr. B. J. Harrington were elected ordinary members, and Sir G. Duncan Gibb, Bart., M.A., M.D., LL.D,, &c., a corresponding member of the Society. Principal Dawson made a communication on the Physical Geography of Prince Edward Island. The paper commenced with noticing the form and geographical position of the Island as a crescent-shaped and much indented expanse of undulating and fertile land, more than 100 miles in length, lying in the almost semicircular bend formed by the southern side of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and separated from the neighbouring coasts of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick by Northumberland Strait. The principal geological formations are the Triassic red sandstones, the almost equally red sandstones of the Upper Carboniferous rocks, which extend across from Nova Scotia and New Bruns- wick, and appear in limited areas on the^Yest Coast and in Hills- borough Bay. The soil of the Island is almost throughout a fer- tile red loam, and the beautifully undulating surface, bright green fields contrasting with the red soil, frequent groves and belts of trees, and neat homesteads, give an appearance of beauty and rural comfort not surpassed by any portion of America. The Island is said to be more thickly peopled and more' highly culti- vated than any other portion of British America of equal extent. Its climate is much more mild and equable than that of Eastern Canada. In July last the horse-mowing machines, which are almost universally used, were to be seen everywhere laying down a crop of hay not to be surpassed in any country, and the wide fields of clean and tall oats presented a magnificent appearance. The potato and turnip are largely cultivated, and wheat to a less extent. In the end of July, however, the author visited a field on the estate of the Hon. Mr. Pope, where a very heavy crop of winter wheat was being cut. The natural fertility of the soil is largely aided by the application to it of mussel or oyster mud obtained in inexhaustible quantities from the old oyster beds of the bays and creeks, by means of dredging machines mounted on rafts in summer and on the ice in winter. No. 3.] NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY. 343 Prince Edward Island possesses excellent sandstone for build - ini^, abundance of brick clay, and large deposits of valuable peat. The Coal Formation rocks underlie the whole of the Island, but are probably at a depth too great to permit their profitable explo- ration at present. Iron, copper, and manganese ores in small quantities occur, but are insufficient for mining purposes. There are beds of useful though impure limestone. Fossil plants, as trunks of coniferous trees and leaves of ferns, occur in great abundance in the beds of the Upper Coal formation, and a few fossil plants occur in the Trias, among them a stem of a cycad, the first discovered in these Provinces. The most remarkable fossil of the latter formation is the large and formidable reptile Batliygnatlius horealis^ an ancient inhabitant of Prince Edward Island, comparable with the great Saurians, which have left their remains in rocks of similar age in the old world. The boulder formation occurs in Prince Edward Island, and in its upper por- tion includes boulders which must have been drifted from Labra- dor on the one hand and New Brunswick on the other. Another very remarkable feature of the modern geology is the great extent of sand dunes or hills of blown sand, along the northern coast. For further details the author referred to a report recently pre- pared by himself and Dr. Harrington, on the geology of this in- eres t ing and important Province. After the reading of this paper. Dr. T. Sterry Hunt made some commendatory remarks on its general scope and scientific aspect, and pointed out that in this Island we have an example of two rock formations resting conformably the one on the other, between which a "lost epoch" (the Permian formation) should have intervened, if the succession of rocks had been unbroken. Dr. B. J. Harrington also gave an account of the peat formations of the Island. Mr. E. Billings read a paper " On some supposed fossils from the Huronian Rocks of Newfoundland." These supposed organisms, as they are provisionally regarded, belong to two species, or at any rate present two kinds of appear- ances, but their affinities are at present exceedingly doubtful. A discussion ensued as to the age of the rocks in which these sup- posed fossils were found, Mr. Billings maintaining (with Mr. A. Murray, the Director of the Geological Survey of Newfoundland), that they are of Huronian age, and Dr. T. Sterry Hunt, that they are of a newer horizon, and belong to the base of the Pri- mordial zone. 344 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. 4th Monthly Meeting, Feb. 26th, 1872. Prof. H. A. Nicholson, of Toronto, was elected a corresponding member of the Society. A paper by Prof. H. A. Nicholson, entitled Sexual Selection in Man, was presented, and Mr. Darwin's yiews on that subject, with Prof. Nicholson's comments thereon, were explained and illustrated by Principal Dawson. Prof. Nicholson's paper will appear in the next No. of this journal. A paper entitled " On the Cultivation of Chenopodium Quinoa," was read by Principal Dawson. This we hope to print also in our next number. Dr. P. P. Carpenter made a communication " On the present condition and causes of the Montreal Death Rate." SOMERVILLE LECTURES. The six Annual Lectures of the Somerville Course were duly delivered as follows : 1. Feb. 8th, 1872.— On Mont Blanc, by Dr. T. Sterry Hunt, F.R.S. 2. Feb. 15th, 1872.— A New England Clam-Bake, by Dr. P. P. Carpenter. 3. Feb. 22nd, 1872. — Applied science as illustrated in the processes of Chromo and Photo-Lithography, by Prof. J. B. Ed- wards, Ph. D., D.C.L., &c. 4. March 7th, 1872. — The elementary principles of Spectrum Analysis, by Prof. G. F. Armstrong, M.A., F.G-.S. 5. March 14th, 1872. — On Thermometers and other measures of Heat, by Dr. G. P. Girdwood. 6. March 21st, 1872. — On Fossil Foot-prints, by Principal Dawson, LL.D., F.R.S. , &c. No. 3.] ' GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY. 345 GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY, On tue Structure or the Paleozoic Crinoids. — The best known living representatives of the Echinoderm class Cri- noidea are the genera Antedon and Pentacrinus — the former the feather stars, tolerably common in all seas ; the latter the stalked sea-lilies, whose only ascertained habitat, until lately, was the deeper portion of the sea of the Antilles, whence they were rarely recovered by being accidentally entangled on fishing-lines. With- in the last few years Mr. Robert Damon, the well-known dealer in natural history objects in "Weymouth, has procured a consider- able number of specimens of the two West Indian Pentacrini, and Dr. Carpenter and the author had an opportunity of making very detailed observations both on the hard and the soft parts. These observations will shortly be published. The genera Antedon and Pentacrinus resemble one another in all essential particulars of internal structure. The great distinc- tion between them is, that while Antedon swims freely in the water, and anchors itself at will by means of a set of " dorsal cirri," Pentacrinus is attached to a jointed stem, which is either perma- nently fixed to some foreign body, or, as in the case of a fine species procured off the coast of Portugal during the cruise of the Porcupine in the summer of 1870, loosely rooted by a whorl of terminal cirri in soft mud. Setting aside the stalk, in Antedon and Pentacrinus the body consists of a rounded central disc and ten or more pinnated arms. A ciliated groove runs along the " oral " or " ventral " surface of the pinnules and arms, and these tributary brachial grooves gradually coalescing, terminate in five radial grooves, which end in an oral opening, usually subcentral, sometimes very excentric. The oesophagus, stomach, and intes- tine coil round a central axis, formed of dense connective tissue, apparently continuous with the stroma of the ovary, and of invo- lutions of the perivisceral membrane ; and the intestine ends in an anal tube, which opens excentrically in one of the inter-radial spaces, and usually projects considerably above the surface of the disc. The contents of the stomach are found uniformly to consist of a pulp composed of particles of organic matter, the shields of diatoms, and the shells of minute foraminifera. The mode of 346 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. nutrition may be readily observed in Anfedon, which will live for months in a tank. The animal rests attached by its dorsal cirri, with its arms expanded like the petals of a full-blown flower. A current of sea water, bearing organic particles, is carried by the cilia along the brachial grooves into the mouth, the water is ex- hausted of its assimilable matter in the alimentary canal, and is finally ejected at the anal orifice. The length and direction of the anal tube prevent the exhausted water and the foecal matter from returniog at once into the ciliated passages. In the probably extinct fimily Cyathocrinidae, and notably in the genus Cyathocrinus, which the author took as the type of the Palaeozoic group, the so-called Crinoidea Tessellata, the arrange- ment, up to a certain point, is much the same. There is a widely- expanded crown of branching arms, deeply grooved, which doubtless performed the same functions as the grooved arms of Pentacrinus ; but the grooves stop short at the edge of the disc, and there is no central opening, the only visible apertures being a tube, sometimes of extreme length, rising from the surface of the disc in one of the inter -radial spaces, which is usually greatly enlarged for its accommodation by the intercalation of additional perisomatic plates, and a small tunnel-like opening through the perisom of the edge of the disc opposite the base of each of the arms, in continuation of the groove of the arm. The functions of these openings, and the mode of nutrition of the crinoid having this structure, have been the subject of much controversy. The author had lately had an opportunity of examining some very remarkable specimens of Cyatliocrinus arthriticus, procured by Mr. Charles Ketley from the Upper Silurians of Wenlock, and a number of wonderfully perfect examples of species of the genera Actinocrinus, Platycrinus, and others, for which he was indebted to the liberality of Mr. Charles Wachsmuth, of Burlington, Ohio, and Mr. Sydney Lyon, of Jefi'ersonville, Indiana ; and he had also had the advantage of studying photographs of plates, showing the internal structure of fossil crinoids, about to be published by Messrs. Meek and "VYorthen, State Geologists for Illinois. A careful examination of all these, taken in connection with the description by Prof. Loven, of Hyponome Sarcii, a recent crinoid lately procured from Torres Strait, had led him to the following general conclusions. In accordance with the views of Dr. Schultze, Dr. Liitken, and Messrs. Meek and Worthen, he regarded the proboscis of the No. 3.] GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY. 347 tesselated crinoids as the anal tube, corresponding in every respect with the anal tube in Antedon and Fentacrinus, and he maintained the opinion which he formerly published (Edin. New Phil. Jour. Jan. 1861), that the valvular '' pyramid " of the Cystideans is also the anus. The true mouth in the tesselated crinoids is an internal opening vaulted over by the plates of perisom, and situated in the axis of the radial system more or less in advance of the anal tube, in the position assigned by Mr. Billings to his '' am- bulacral opening." Five, ten, or more openings round the edge of the disc lead into channels continuous with the grooves in the ventral surface of the arms, either covered over like the mouth by perisomatic plates, the inner surface of which they more or less impress, and supported beneath by chains of ossicles ; or, in rare cases (^Amplioracrinus), tunnelled in the substance of the greatly thickened walls of the vault. These internal passages, usually reduced in number to five by unitiDg with one another, pass into the internal mouth, into which they doubtless lead the current from the ciliated brachial grooves. In connection with different species of Platyceras with various crinoids," over whose anal openings they fix themselves, moulding the edges of their shells to the form of shell of the crinoid, is a case of •' commensualism," in which the mollusc takes advantage for nutrition and respiration of the current passing through the alimentary canal of the echinoderm. Hyponoine Sarsii appears, from Prof. Loven's description, to be a true crinoid, closely allied to Antedon, and does not seem in any way to resemble the Cysti- deans. It has, however, precisely the same arrangement as to its internal radial vessels and mouth which we find in the older cri- noids. It bears the same structural relation to Antedon which Extracrinus bears to Pentacrinus. Some examples of different tesselated crinoids from the Burling- ton limestone, most of them procured by Mr. Wachsmuth, and described by Messrs. Meek and "Worthen, show a very remarkable convoluted plate, somewhat in form like the shell of a ScapTiander^ placed vertically in the centre of the cup, in the position occupied by the fibrous axis or columella in Fentacriniis and Antedon' Mr. Billings, the distinguished palaeontologist to the Survey of Canada, in a very valuable paper on the structure of the Crinoidea, Cystidea, and Blastoidea (^SilUnian's Joimial, January, 1870), advocates the view that the plate is connected with the apparatus of respiration, and that it is homologous with 348 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. the pectinated rhombs of Cystideans, the tube apparatus of Pen- tremites, and the sand-canal of Asterids. Messrs Meek and Worthen and Dr. Liitken, on the other hand, regard it as asso- ciated in some way with the alimentary canal and the function of nutrition. The author strongly supported the latter opinion. The peri- visceral membrane in Antedon and Pentacrinus already alluded to, which lines the whole calyx, and whose involutions, support- ing the coils of the alimentary canal, contribute to the formation of the central columella, is crowded with miliary grains and small plates of carbonate of line; and a very slight modification would convert the whole into a delicate fenestrated calcareous plate. Some of the specimens in Mr. AVachsmuth's collection show the open reticulated tissue of the central coil continuous over the whole of the interior of the calyx, and rising on the walls of the vault, thus following almost exactly the course of the perivisceral membrane in the recent forms. In all likelihood, therefore, the internal calcareous network in the crinoids, whether rising into a convoluted plate or lining the cavity of the crinoid head, is simply a calcified condition of the perivisceral sac. The author was inclined to agree with Mr. Eofe and Mr. Bil- lings in attributing the functions of respiration to the pectinated rhombs of the Cystideans and the tube apparatus of the Blastoids. He did not see, however, that any equivalent arrangement was either necessary or probable in the crinoids with expanded arm, in which the provisions for respiration, in the form of tubular tentacles and respiratory films and lobes over the whole extent of the arms and pinnules, are so elaborate and complete. — Abstract of a paper 7'ead before the Royal Society of Edinburgh^ by Prof. Wyville Thomson, April 3, 1871. From " Nature.'' On the supposed Legs of the Trilobite, Asaphus pla- TYCEPHALUS. By James D. Dana. — (Am. Jour. Sci. May, 1871 .) * At the request of Mr. E. Billings of Montreal, I have recently examined the specimen of Asaphus platycephalus be- * In the last number of this Journal, p. 227, an abstract from the Report of the Committee of the Brit. Association on Fossil Crustacea was published, and this paper should have appeared at the same time. In the March number of the Am. Jour. Sci., Prof. Dana has given a second notice, in reply to Mr. Woodward. We shall publish them both together. No. 3.] GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY. 349 longing to tlie Canadian Geological Museum, which has been supposed to show remains of legs. Mr. Billings, while he has suspected the organs to be legs so far as to publish on the sub- ject, * has done so with reserve, saying, in his paper, " that the first and all -important point to be decided, is whether or not the forms exhibited on its under side, were truly what they appeared to be, locomotive organs." On account of his "doubts, the speci- men was submitted by him during the past year to the Geological Society of London ; and for the same reason, notwithstanding the corroboration there received, he oflfered to place the specimen in my hands for examination and report. Besides giving the specimen an examination myself, I have submitted it also to Mr. A. E. Verrill, Prof, of Zoology in Yale College, who is well versed in the invertebrates, and to Mr. S. I Smith, assistant in the same department, and excellent in crusta- ceology and entomology. We have separately and together consi- dered the character of the specimen, and while we have reached the same conclusion, we are to be regarded as independent judges. Our opinion has been submitted to Mr. Billings, and by his request it is here published. The conclusion to which we have come is that the organs are not legs, but the semi-calcified arches in the membrane of the ventral surface to which the foliaceous appendages, or legs, were attached. Just such arches exist in the ventral surface of the Macroura, and to them the abdominal appendages are articulated. This conclusion is sustained by the observation that in one part of the venter three consecutive parallel arches are distinctly connected by the intervening outer membrane of the venter, showing that the arches were plainly in the membrane^ as only a calcified portion of it, and were not members moving free above it. This being the fact, it seems to set at rest the question as to the legs. We should add, however, that there is good reason for believing the supposed legs to have. been such arches in their con- tinuing of nearly uniform width almost or quite to the lateral margin of the animal ; and in the additional fact, that, although curving forward in their course toward the margin, the successive arches are about equidistant or parallel, a regularity of position • Q. J. Geol. Soc, No. 104, p. 479, 1870, with a plate giving a full- sized view of the under surface of the trilohitc, a species that was over four inches in length. 350 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Yol. vi. not to be looked for in free-moving legs. The curve in these arches, although it implies a forward ventral extension on either side of the leg-bearing segments of the body, does not appear to afford any good reason for doubting the above conclusion. It is probable that the two prominences on each arch nearest the median line of the body, which are rather marked, were points of muscular attachment for the foliaceous appendage it supported. With the exception of these arches, the under surface of the venter must have been delicately membranous, like that of the abdomen of a lobster or other macrouran. Unless the under sur- face were in the main fleshy, trilobites could not have rolled into a ball. Supposed Legs of Trilobites.— Mr. Henry "Woodward, of the British Museum, in a reply to the paper by the writer in volume i, p. 320, of the present series of this Journal, supports the view that the supposed legs are real legs. He says that the remark that the calcified arches were plainly a calcified portion of the membrane or skin of the under surface is " an error, arising from the supposition that the matrix represented a part of the organism." But Prof. Yerrill, Mr. Smith and myself are confi- dent that there is on the specimen an impression of the skin of the under surface, and that this surface extended and connected with the arches, so that all belonged distinctly together. Moreover the arches are exceedingly slender, far too much so for the free legs of so large an animal ; the diameter of the joints is hardly more than a sixteenth of an inch outside measure ; and hence there is no room inside for the required muscles. In fact, legs with such proportions do not belong to the class of Crust- aceans. Moreover the shell (if it is the shell of a leg instead of a calcified arch) is relatively thick, and this makes the matter worse. We still hold that the regular spacing of these arches along the under surface renders it very improbable that they were legs. Had they been closely crowded together, this argument would be of less weight ; but while so very slender, they are a fourth of an inch apart. Mr, Wooward's comparison between the usual form of the arches in a Macrouran and that in the trilobite does not appear to us to prove anything. We therefore still believe that the specimen does not give us any knowledge of the actual legs of the trilobite. Mr. Woodward's paper is contained in vol. vii No. 7, of the G-eological Magazine. j. D. d. no. 3.] geology and mineralogy. 351 3. Note on the Discovery of Fossils in the " Winooski Marble " at Swanton, Vt. ; by E. Billings, F.G.S., Palae- ontologist of the Geol. Surv. Canada. — A few days ago Mr. Solon M. Allis, of Burlington, Vt., visited our museum and informed me that he had a specimen of the Winooski marble of Swanton which contained some fossils. Since then he has sent it to me* It contains, abundantly, a species of Salterella, which I believe to be the S. pulcJiella described in my Pal. Foss., vol. i, p. 18. This marble, both at Swanton and St. Albans, seems to underlie the Geologia slates. It is generally of a reddish, mottled color, but sometimes gray or greenibh. The limestone at the straits of Belle Isle, in which >S^. ijuhhella is found, is also red, gray and greenish ; and is, I have no doubt, of the same age. At this latter locality it overlies a red or brownish sandstone, conformably, which holds ScoUthus linearis. I consider the Belle Isle sand- stone to be the '' Quartz rock " of the Green mountains of Ver- mont. In that case, the limestone at Belle Isle occupies, strati- graphically, the position of the Stockbridge limestone as repre- sented by Dr. Emmons in his American Geology, part 2, p. 19. On page 19 of the same work, Dr. E., speaking of the Stockbridge limestone, says : " It is reddish at Williamston and is intimately blended with silex." In his Report on the Second Geological District of New York, in 1838, page 232, he gives a section of the rocks at Burlington combined with one of the strata at Port Kent. He there notices a gray limestone (at Burlington) of which he says : — " It is a stratum, which in Berkshire county, and other parts of the country, has generally been placed among the primary rocks ; it is identical with the limestone at the base of Saddle mountain, and which covers more or less of the western flank of the Green Mountains." If the limestone to which he alludes is one of the gray varieties of the Winooski marble, then he is most probably right. I believe Mr. Allis' s fossils are the first that have been found in the Winooski marble. ZOOLOGY AND BOTANY. Deep-Sea Dredging in the Gulp of St. Lawrence. — The marine zoology of the deeper parts of the River and Gulf of the St. Lawrence has not been investigated until quite recently. This summer, under the auspices of the Natural History Society of 352 THE CANADIAN NATtTRALIST. [Vol. yi. Montreal, and in consequence of the kindness of the Hon. Peter Mitchell, Minister of Marine and Fisheries for the Dominion (who not only gave me facilities for dredging or board Govern- ment vessels, but also caused sufl&cient rope to be provided for the purpose), depths of from 50 to 250 fathoms were successfully examined. The greatest depth in the Grulf, to the west of the Island of Newfoundland, as given in the Admiralty charts, is 313 fathoms. The cruise lasted five weeks, the first three of which were spent on board the Government shooner La Canadienne, and the re- maining two on the Stella Maris. The area examined includes an entire circuit round the Island of Anticosti, and extends from Point des Monts (on the north shore of the St. Lawrence) to a spot about half way between the east end of Anticosti and the Bird Kocks. As these investigations were almost necessarily subordinate to the special duties on which the schooners were engaged, in several cases the same ground was gone over twice. The bottom at great depths generally consists of a tough clayey mud, the surface of which is occasionally dotted with large stones. So far as I could judge, using an ordinary thermometer, the average temperature of this mud was about 37° to 38° Fahren- heit, at least on the north shore. In the deepest parts of the river, on the south shore, between Anticosti and part of the Gaspe Peninsula, the thermometer registered a few degrees higher. Sand dredged on the north shore in 25 fathoms also made the mercury sink to 37° to 38°. Many interesting Foraminifera and Sponges were obtained, but as yet only a few of these have been examined with any care. A number of Pennatulae were dredged south of Anticosti ; the genus has not been previously recorded, so far as I am aware, as inhabit- ing the Atlantic coast of America. They were found in mud, at depths of 160 and 200 fathoms, and it [seems probable that this species, at least, is sedentary, and that it lives with a portion of the base of the stem rooted in the soft mud. Actinia dianthus and Tealia crassicornis were frequent in 200 to 250 fathoms. The Echinoderms characteristic of the greater depths are a Sjpa- tangus (specifically distinct from the common British species), Ctenodicus crispatus, OphioglypJia Sarcii (very large), Ophia- cantha spimdosa, and Amphiura Holhollii. Marine worms, of many genera and species, were both numerous and fine. Among the more interesting of theCrustacea were Nj/mphon grossipes (J) Ko. 3.] ZOOLOGY AND BOTANY. 353 and a species of Pycnogonum. Several of the last-named crus- taceans were taken at a depth of 250 fathoms, entangled on a swab, fastened in front of a deep-sea lead, which was attached to the rope, a few feet from the mouth of the dredge. This cir- cumstance tends to show that the genus is not always parasitic in its habits. The Decapods, Amphipods, &;c., at least those of greatest interest, have not yet been identified. Among the most noticeable of the marine Polyzoa are Defrancia truncataj and what appears to be a Retepora. Not many species in this group were obtained in very deep water, and those procured were, for the most part, of small size. About six species of Tunicates were collected. Beino; anxious to have Mr. J. Gwyn Jeffreys' opinion upon the various species of Mollusca during his visit to Montreal, I studied these carefully first, and submitted the whole of them to him for examination. Twenty-four species of Testaceous Mol- lusca were obtained at depths of from 90 to 250 fathoms. Nearly all of these are Arctic forms, and eleven of them are new to the continent of America. The following are some of the most interesting of the deep- water Lamellibranchiata : — Pecfa grcenlandicus of Chemnitz, but not of Sowerby ; * Area pectuncido ides Scacchi; Yold'ia luc'ida Loveu ; Y.frigida * Torell ; Keoera artica ^ Sars ; N. Obesa^ Loven. Among the novelties in the Gasteropoda of the same zone are the subjoined : — Dentalium ahyssoruTn Sars ; Siphonodcnta- lium vitreumSavs; Eidima stenostoma J e^reys ] Bel a Trevelt/ana Turton*; Chrysodomus (^Sipho) AS^arsu Jeffreys.* Three Brachio- pods occur in the Gulf, of which Rhi/nchonella j^sittacea and Tere- hratella Sjntzhergensis are found in about 20 — 50 fathoms, and Terebratula septentrionalis in from 100 — 250. A few rare shells were obtained in comparatively shallow water; among them an undescribed TelUna (of the section Macoma), a new Odostomia, and Chrysodomus (^SijyJio') Spitzhergensis^ Beeve. Nor were even the Vertebrata unrepresented; from a depth of 96 fathoms off Trinity Bay, a young living example of the '* Norway Had- dock " (^Sehastes Norvegiciis') was brought up in the dredge. And off Charleton Point, Anticosti, in 112 fathoms, on a stony bot- tom, two small fishes were also taken ; one, a juvenile wolf fish • I am indebted to Mr. Jeffreys for the identification of species to Which an asterisk is attached. He corroborates also my determina- tion of the remainder. Vol. VI. p No. S- 354 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Yol. vl. (^Anarrliicas lupus) the other a small gurnard, a species of Ago- 71US, probably A. hexagonus Sshneid. The similarity of the deep-sea fauna of the St. Lawrence to that of the quaternary deposits of Norway, as described by the late Dr. Sars, is somewhat noticeable. PennatuUe, Oj^hiura Sarsii, Ctenodlscus crispatus, several Mollusca, &c., are common to both ; but on the other hand, the absence of so many charac teristic European invertebrates on the American side of the Atlantic should be taken into consideration. The resemblance between the recent fauna of the deeper parts of the St. Lawrence, and that of the Post-pliocene deposits of Canada, does not seem very close, but our knowledge of each is so limited that any gene- ralisations would be premature. — J. F.Whiteaves in "Nature." Fish-Nest in the Sea-Weed of the Sargasso Sea. — • Extracts from a letter from Professor Agassiz to Prof. Peirce, Superintendent U. S. Coast Survey, dated Hassler Expedition, St. Thomas, Dec. 15, 1871.— ^ ^ * The most interesting discovery of the voyage thus far is the finding of a nest built by a fish, floating on the broad ocean with its live freight. On the 13th of the month, Mr. Mansfield, one of the ofiicers of the Hassler, brought me a ball of Gulf weed which he had just picked up, and which excited my curiosity to the utmost. It was a round mass of sargassum about the size of two fists,' rolled up together. The whole consisted, to all appearance, of nothing but Gulf weed, the branches and leaves of which were, however, evidently knit together, and not merely balled into a roundish mass ; for, though some of the leaves and branches huns: loose from the rest, it became at once visible that the bulk of the ball was held together by threads trending in every direction, among the sea-weed, as if a couple of handfuls of branches of sargassum had been rolled up together with elastic threads trending in every direction. Put back into a large bowl of water, it became apparent that this mass of sea-weed was a nest, the central part of which was more closely bound up together in the form of a ball, with several loose branches extending in various directions, by which the whole was kept floating. A more careful examination very soon revealed the fact that the elastic threads which held the Gulf weed together were beaded at intervals, sometimes two or three beads beiog close to- gether, or a bunch of them hanging . from the same cluster of No. 3.] ZOOLOGY AND BOTANY. 355 threads, or they were, more rarely, scattered at a greater distance one from the other. Nowhere was there much regularity ob- servable in the distribution of the beads, and they were found scattered throughout the whole ball of sea-weeds pretty uniformly. The beads themselves were about the size of an ordinary pin's head. We had, no doubt, a nest before us, of the most curious kind ; full of Cfrors too ; the e2:j2;s scattered throui^hout the mass of the nest and not placed together in a cavity of the whole struc- ture. What animal could have built this singular nest, was the next question. It did not take much time to ascertain the class of the animal kingdom to which it belongs. A common pocket lens at once revealed two large eyes upon the side of the head, and a tail bent over the back of the body, as the embryo uni- formly appears in ordinary fishes shortly before the period of hatching. The many empty egg-cases observed in the nest gave promise of an early opportunity of seeing some embryos freeing themselves from their envelope. Meanwhile a number of these eggs with live embryos were cut out of the nest and placed in separate glass jars to multiply the chances of preserving them, while the nest as a whole was secured in alcohol, as a memorial of our unexpected discovery. The next day I found two em- bryos in one of my glass jars; they occasionally moved in jerks, and then rested for a long while motionless upon the bottom of the jar. On the third day I had over a dozen of these young fishes in my rack, the oldest of which began to be more active, and promised to afford further opportunities for study. ^ ^ ^ 'But what kind of fish was this ? About the time of hatching, the fins of this class cf animals differ too much from those of the adult, and the general form exhibits too few peculiar- ities, to afford any clue to this problem. I could suppose only that it would probably prove to be one of the pelagic species of the Atbntic, and of these the most common are Exocoetus, Nau- cratus, Scopelus, Chironectes, Syngnathus, Monacanthus, Tetrao- don and Diodon. Was there a way to come nearer to a correct solution of my doubts ? As I had in former years made a somewhat extensive study of the pigment cells of the skin^ in a variety of young fishes, I now resorted to this method to identify my embryos. Happily we had on board several pelagic fishes alive, which could afford means of comparison, but unfortunately the steamer was shaking too much and rolling too heavily, for microscopic observation of even moder- 356 tHE CANAl)IAN NATURALIST. [Yol. 11. atelj high power. Nothing however, should be left untried, and the very first comparison I made secured the desired result. The pigment cells of a young Chironectes pictus proved identical with those of our little embryos. It thus stands as a well authenticated fact that the common pelagic Chironectes of the Atlantic (named Chironectes jnctus by Cuvier), builds a nest for its eggs in which the progeny is wrap- ped up with the materials of which the nest itself is composed ; and as these materials are livina; Grulf weed, the fish-cradle, rock- ing upon the deep ocean, is carried along as an undying arbor, affording at the same time protection and afterward food for its livins; freio-ht. This marvelous story acquires additional interest if we now take into consideration what are the characteristic peculiarities of the Chironectes. As its name indicates, it has fins like hands ; that is to say, the pectoral fins are supported by a kind of prolonged^ wrist like appendages, and the rays of the ventrals are not unlike rude fingers. With these limbs these fishes have long been known to attach themselves to sea-weed, and rather to walk than to swim in their natural element. But now that we have become acquiant- ed with their mode of reproduction, it may fairly be asked if the most important use to which their peculiarly constructed fins are put is not probably in building their nest. — SiUima7is Journal. pRor. Agassiz's Expedition. — It is probable that I may have been anticipated, as regards part of the present communica- tion. If not, I believe that many of your readers will be glad to learn the objects with which Prof. Agassiz has started, with Count Pourtales and a distinguished band of skilled observers, on a scientific expedition in the United States' surveying ship IlassJevy and to receive a brief account of what he has already done at St. Thomas and Barbados, at which places he was obliged to touch, in consequence of defects in the vessel or her machinery. The Expedition was detained some days at St. Thomas, and the time of the Professor and his assistants was devoted chiefly to the collection and preparation of fishes, with a view to the study of the brain, and the breathing and digestive organs. Several boxes full, preserved in alcohol, were at once shipped to the United States, as the first-fruits of the Expedition. The party arrived at Barbados on December 26, and spent four days there. The first two were devoted by the Professor to exa- ^0. 3.] ZOOLOGY AND BOTANY. 357 miuing and studying the large collection of West Indian shells, marine and terrestrial, of corals, sponges, Crustacea, semi-fossil shells of the island, made by the Governor, Mr. Rawson. Of the marine series he wrote in the following terms to Mr. J, G. Anthony, the Curator of the Harvard Museum: — " I am having high carnival. I have found here what I did not expect to find anywhere in the world — a collection of shells in which the young are put up with as much care as the adult, and extensive series of specimens show the whole range of changes of the species, from the formation of the nucleus to the adult." He was particularly struck with the now unique specimen of Holopus, lately procured by Mr. Rawson, which was described by Dr. J. E. Gray in the December number of the ''Annals of Natural History," and named by him, from a drawing, H. Rawsoni, but which Agassiz, who had seen the specimen of D'Orbigny in Paris, before it disap- peared, considers to be a normal specimen of //. Banzii, which had only four, instead of five arms. Count Pourtales recognised amon^: the corals several similar to those which he had obtained by dredging in or near the Gulf Stream, and described in the latest No. (4) of the " Illustrated Catalogue of the Museum of (Comparative Zoology at Harvard College," the presence of which ron the coast of Barbados serves to indicate the close similarity of ^submarine life in those two distant localities. The next two days, or rather the night of the next, and the greater part of the following day, were spent in dredging in the neigiibourhood, in a depth of 60 to 120 fathoms, about a mile from the shore, whence Mr. Rawson has procured his fine speci- mens of Pentacrinus Millleri. The Holopus was found on the -opposite side of the island. The results were beyond the expecta- tions, or even the hopes, of the most sanguine of the party. Only dead fragments of the Pentacrinus were obtained, but among the abundant spoils were four specimens of a new genus of Crinoid, without arms on the stem, (like Rhizocrimis ?) which remained alive, with the arms in motion, until noon on the following day, under the excited observation of the party. A number of deep- sea corals, alive, Crustacea, sea urchins of new species, star fish, sponges (crutaccous, Jurassic.) and corallines, &c., and a rich har- vest of shells, were obtained. Among these was a splendid live specimen of Pleurotomaria Quoyana, F and B, of which genus Chenu writes that only one living species, and of that only one specimen, is known. The animal exhibited remarkable affinities, 358 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST, [Vol, Yi, and the artist accompanying the expedition was able to takq (several sketches of it. A large Oniscia, shaped like 0. cancellatoi Sow., but with an orange inner lip (0. Dennisonif), some speci- mens of FJiorus Indicus Gmel., a magnificent new species of Jjatiaxis, with many exquisite specimens of Fleurotoma, Fusus^ Jilurex, Scalaria, and three or four of Fedicularia sicula Sw.,. with iunumerable Pteropods and Terebratulinse, rewarded these ^' burglars of the deep." The Professor was delighted, and it was with reluctance he abandoned so rich a field in order to secure his passing through the Straits of Magellan at a right season. Barbados, January 26, — From ^'Nature.'/ Agassiz's Deep-Sea Explorations. — 3fore about the trilo- hites, — The following letter has been received by Prof. Peirce of Harvard College from Prof. Agassiz, giving interesting details respecting some of the results of the researches of the Hassler jExpedition : *tata (Philippi) at Berlin, and having carefully compared these specimens with the published descriptions and figures, I am convinced that both be- long not only to the same genus but to the same species. What seems to have been in the mind of Mr. Dall when he penned his hasty critique was that Professor Seguenza of Messina had re- ferred a species of Terehratella from the Sicilian tertiaries to Philippi's species and a species of Terehratula found in the same formation to Lov^n's species. The former may be the Terehra- tella Marian of Mr. Arthur Adams from the Japanese seas ; the latter I have ascertained to be rather widely distributed in the North Atlantic. I have the honour to be, Sii*j Your very obedient servant, J. GwTN Jeffreys* Montreal, 6th October, 1871. Published April, 1872. ?1.YII. Critical and Rare Post-pliocene Species. [ Canadian Naturalist Drawa on Stone, hy i\J_D. Leggo fitC? Lith., Montreal. IV. POLYZOON, BRACHIOPODS, AND LAMELLIBRANCHIATES (Post-pliocene — Canada. ) Fig. 1. Fig. 2. Fig. 3. Fig. 4. Fig. 6. Fig. 5. Fig. 7. Fig. 8. Fig. Fig. Fig. Fig. Fig. Fig. Fig. Fig. Lcpralia ijuadricornuta, Montreal (magnified). Rhynchonella psittacea, Riviere-du-Loup. Terebratella Spitzbergensis^ Riviere-du-Loup. Alya truncata—\d.x. Uddn'allensis — Montreal. Mya truncata — Var. communis — Portland. Patiopca Non'gica, Riviere-du-Loup. Saxicava rugosa — Var. Arctua — Montreal. Astarie Laurentiana, Montreal. V. LAMELLIBRANCHIATA. (Post-pliocene— Canada.) Fig. 1. FiL^ 3. Fig. 2. Fig. 5. Fig. 6. Fig, 9. Fig. 10. Fig. 7. Fig. 8. Fig. 11. Fig. I. Modiolaria nigra, Portland. Fig. 2. MytUus edidis — (Var. elegans) — Montreal. Fig. 3. Aiacoma calcarea, Riviere-du-Lx)up. Fig. 4. Maconui Grcenlandka, Riviere-du-Loup. Fig. 5. Mcuoma infiata, Riviere-du-Loup. Fig. 6. Leda pernula — (Var. tenuisculata) — Riviere-du-Loup. Fig. 7. Leda pernula — (Var. buccata) — Riviere-du-Loup. Fig. 8. Leda minuta, Riviere-du-Loup. Fig. 9. L^eda {Portlandia) glacialis, Montreal. Fig. 10. Nucula expanse, Riviere-du-Loup. Fig. II. Leda (Vo/dia) limaiuia, Riviere-du-Loup. VI. GASTEROPODA. (Post-pliocene— Canada.) Fig. 1. Fig. 2. Fig. 3. Fig. 4. Fig. 5. Fig. 6. Fig, 9. Fig. 11. Fig. 8. Fig. 12. Fig. 7. Fig. 10. FIG. 1. Haminea solitaria, Montreal. 2. Lepeta caca, Montreal. 3. Plates of Amicida Emersonii, Montreal. 4. Trichotropis arctica ? Montreal. 5. Veluiina zonata^ Montreal. 6. Natica clajtsa, Montreal. 7. Admete viridula^ Montreal. Fig. 13. FIG. 8. Fusus tornatus, Montreal. 9. /7lontreal, rare. Recent — Gaspe ; Grand Manan (Stimpsou) ; Nova Scotia (Willis). It is Phlline lima, Brown, according to Jeffreys. CyUchna alha, Brown. Fossil — Montreal ; Riviere-du-Loup ; also in the Clyde beds. Recent — Gasp^ ; Labrador (Packard) ; Gulf St. Lawrence, common (Whiteaves) ; Arctic seas generally. Same or similar on West Coast at Sitka (P.P.C.) CyUrhna oryza, Totten. Fossil — Montreal. Recent — Coast of New Enoland. Cylichna mideola, Reeve. Fossil — Montreal; rare, and perhaps doubtful. Recent — Arctic seas. Cyliclina occulta, Mighels and Adams. Fossil — Montreal ; Murray Bay ; Maine. Recent — Greenland to New England. Cylichna striata, Brown. Fossil — Riviere-du-Loup and Clyde beds. Recent — Arctic seas. * Except when otherwise stated, all the Gasteropods are found in the Leda clay, or at its junction with the Saxicava sand. No. 4.] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 387 Bulla (^Haminea) solitaria, Say. Fossil — Montreal; rather common. Recent — New England and northward. If this species is rightly determined, it furnishes a curious in- stance of a somewhat southern species occurring in the drift of Montreal. The Jlaminece, however, can scarcely be identified by weathered or fossil specimens, so that this may possibly be a nor- thern form distinct from solitaria. Bulla (^Dia2)hana) dehilis, Gould. Fossil — Montreal. Recent — Gulf St. Lawrence (Whiteaves) ; Greenland to New England. Jeffreys considers it the same with B. hi/alina, Turton. If so, it is a shell of the Clyde beds and of the Arctic seas generally. Bulla (^Utricidus) pertenuis^ Mighels. Fossil — Montreal. Recent — Labrador (Whiteaves) ; Gulf St. Lawrence, and south to Cape Cod. According to Jeffreys it is U. turritus, Moller, Greenland. Helix sti'iatella, Anthony. Fossil — Pakenham, Saxicava sand. Lymnea iimhrosa, Say. Fossil — Montreal. Lymnea cajJerata, Say. Fossil — Montreal. Lymnea elodes, Say. Fossil — Pakenham Mills, Saxicava sand. Flanorhis bicarinatus, Say, Fossil — Pakenham Mills, Saxicava sand. Planorhis trivolvis, Say. Fossil — Pakenham 3Iills, Saxicava sand. Planorhis parvus^ Say. Fossil — Pakenham Mills, Saxicava sand. All of the above pulmonates are modern Canadian species, and seem to have been drifted by some fresh-water stream into the sea of the Saxicava sand and Leda clay. q 88 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. Siphono-dentaliwm vitreum, Sars. Fossil — Leda clay, Murray Bay; also Norway (Sars). Recent — Gulf of St. Lawrence (Whiteaves) ; coast of Norway (Sars.) It is a rare deep-water shell. Amicula Emersonii, Couthuoy. Fossil — Montreal. Recent — Murray Bay ; Halifax ; coast of New England. My specimens are merely detached valves. They indicate an animal quite similar to specimens from Halifax referred to this species, but differ slightly from specimens from Murray Bay. Dr. Carpenter has labelled the drift form var. " altior." The dif- ferences among the recent specimens, as well as the fossil valves, will be discussed in the " Contributions to a Monograph of the Chitonidae," about to be printed by the Smithsonian Institution. Pancturella (Cemorla) Noachina, Linn. Fossil — Quebec ; Riviere-du-Loup ; Clyde beds. Recent — Gulf St. Lawrence generally ; and throughout the Arctic seas and North Atlantic. Acmcea tesfudinalis, Moller. Fossil — Labrador. Recent — Gulf St. Lawrence generally ; and throughout the Arctic seas and North Atlantic. My only fossil specimen, obtained from Dr. Packard, is of the small, elevated and depauperated variety so common at Murray Bay and the north shore of the Gulf. It is curious that this common modern species is so very rare in the Post-pliocene. Lepeta coeca, Moller. Fossil — Montreal ; Rivi^re-du-Loup ; Quebec ; Labrador ; European Post-pliocene. Recent — Gaspe ; Labrador ; Arctic seas generally ; and coast of New England rarely. This shell is not at all rare, living at Gasp^, and fossil at Riviere-du-Loup. Carpenter remarks that some of my Montreal specimens have the characters of variety striata of Middendorff from Siberia. Ca^julus commodus, Middendorff. Fossil — Point Levi, near Quebec. One specimen only, found by Mr. Gunn and communicated by Dr. W. J. Anderson. Recent — Scotland (Jeffreys). No. 4.] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 389 This species is fossil at Uddevalla, and is supposed to be the same with C.fallax and C. obliquatus of Wood from the English Crag. It has not yet been recognized on the American coast. (See Figure.) Margarita helicina, Fabricius. Fossil — Montreal ; Murray Bay. Young specimens resemble M. acuminata of Mighels. Broad Specimens resemble 31. campanulata, Morse. Recent — x\rctic seas ; Gulf of St. Lawrence ; and coast of New England. It is M. Arctica, Leach. Margarita argentata, Gould. Fossil — Montreal, rare. Recent — Labrador and Gulf St. Lawrence (Whiteaves) ; Mur- ray Bay ; Gaspe ; coast of New England and Nova Scotia ? Possibly the same with M. glauca, Moll., from Greenland. Margarita cinerea, Couthuoy. Fossil — Riviere-du-Loup, Portland. Recent — Gasp^ ; Labrador ; Greenland to New England ; var« striata, Dall, Sitka. Cyclostrema, (^3fdlle?'ia^ costulata, Moller. Fossil — Montreal; Clyde beds; Uddevalla. Recent — Gasp^ ; Arctic seas to New England. Cyclostrema Cutleriaiia, Clark. Fossil — Montreal, rare. This is an Arctic and British shell, as yet recognized only at Montreal. Turritella erosa, Couthuoy. Fossil — Labrador; Rivicre-du-Loup ; Montreal? • Recent — Greenland to New England. Turritella, reticulata, Mighels. Fossil — Labrador (Packard). Recent — Labrador to Gulf St. Lawrence ; also fishing banks, Nova Scotia (Willis). My specimens received from Dr. Packard are marked T. costu- lata, but seem rather to be the above species. 390 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. Turrit ella acicula, Stimpson. Fossil — Rivi^re-du-Loup ; Lnbrador (Packard). Recent — Murray Bay ; coast of New England. There may be some reason to donbt whether this is not a variety of T. erosa. It is quite possible that the above species should be regarded as Mesalice. ^ Palnd'iiia (^Melantho) decisa, Say. Fossil — Pakenham Mills, Saxicava sand. Recent — Ei stern America generally. VaJvata tricxrinata, Siy. Possil — P ikenham Mills, with the preceding. R cent — E istern America generally. Anil I tenia limosa. S-y. Fossil — P ikenham Mills, with the preceding. Recent — Hudson's B:iy to Virginia. This was A. par at a of the previous lists. Littorina rudis, Donovan. Fossil — Riviere- du-Loup ; also Clyde beds and Uddevalla. Recent — Arctic seas to New England and European coasts. L. tenebrosa, which may be regarded as a variety, is also found at Riviere-du-Loup. Rissoa castanea, M oiler. Fossil — Montreal. Recent — Gaspe ; Labrador; Trinity Bay (Whiteaves). Rissoa exarata, Stimpson. Fossil — Montreal. Recent — New England. Rissoa scrohiculata, Moller. Fossil — Montreal. • Itecent — Greenland; Gulf St. Lawrence, 200 to 300 fathoms, large; and small, Gaspe, 30 fathoms (Whiteaves). Bela harpularia, Couthuoy. ]?ossil — Montreal; Quebec; Murray Bay; Riviere du-Loup (large specimens). Recent — Gulf St. Lawrence ; very fine at Murray Bay, and similar to large specimens from Riviere-du-Loup ; coast of New England. It is B. Woodiana, Moller (J. F. W.) No. 4.] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 391 Bela elegans, Mollcr. Fossil — 3Iontreal. Recent — Greenland and Norway ; closely allied to next species. Bela pyramidalis, Strom. Fossil — Montreal ; also Crag, Clyde beds and Uddevalla. Recent — Labrador (Packard) ; Gulf St. Lawrence (White- aves) ; Murray Bay, and south to Cape Cod ; Arctic seas gene- rally. It is the B. pleurotomaria of Couthouy. and B. Vahlii of Beck. Bela fui'ricula, Montagu. Fossil — Montreal; Riviere- du-Loup; Labrador; also Red Crag and Uddevalla (Jeffreys). Recent — Gulf of St. Lawrence and coast of Nova Scotia and New Eni>;land. I include under this name ^.?io6?7is of Moller ; B. Americana, Packard; B. scalaris, Moller; B. exarata, Muller, Morch ; and B. angulata, Reeve. The var. noh'dis is found at Montreal and Gasp^ ; also young shells not distinguishable from exarata. Var. scalaris, occurs at Riviere-du-Loup and Labrador. This shell is a widely diffused and somewhat variable northern species. Mr, Whiteaves, hewever, regards B. nohilis, B. exarata, and B. sca- lar is as distinct. Bela TreveUiana, Turton. Fossil- — Riviere-du-Loup; Labrador; also Clyde beds and Norway (Jeffreys). Recent — Murray Bay ; Arctic seas, and Greenland to Massa- chusetts. It is probably B. decussata of Couthuoy. B. excurvata from Puget Sound, may prove another variety. Bela ciolacea, Migical time. No geologist doubts that the Post-pliocene was a period of considerable duration. The great elevations and depressions of the land, the extensive erosions, the wide and thick beds of sediment, all testify to the lapse of time. The changes which occurred were fruitful in modifications of depth and temperature. Deep waters were shallowed, and the sea overflowed areas of land. The tempera- ture of the waters changed greatly, so that the geographical dis- tribution of marine animals was materially afiected. Yet all the Post-pliocene species survive, and this without change. Even variable forms like the species of Bitccinum and Astar-te show the same range of variation in the Post-pliocene as in the mo- dern, and though some varieties have changed their geographical position, they have not changed their character. This result is obviously independent of imperfection of the geological record, because there is no reason to doubt that these species have con- tinuously occupied the North x\tlantic area, and we have great abundance of them for comparison both in the Post-pliocene and the modern seas. It is also independent of any questions as to the limits of species and varieties, inasmuch as it depends on careful comparisons of the living and fossil specimens ; and by whatever names we may call these, their similarity or dissimi- larity remains unaffected. We have at present no means of tracing this fauna as a whole farther back. Some of its mem- bers we know existed in the Pliocene and Miocene without spe- cific difference ; but some day the middle tertiaries of Greenland may reveal to us the ancestors of these shells, if they lived so far back, and may throw further light on their origin. In the meantime we can affirm that the lapse of time since the Pliocene has not sufficed even to produce neW races ; and the inevitable conclusion is that any possible derivation of one species from another is pushed back infinitely, that the origin of specific types is quite distinct from varietal modification, and that the latter attains to a maximum in a comparatively short time, and then runs on unchanged, except in so far as geological vicissitudes may change the localities of certain varieties. This is precisely the same conclusion at which I have elsewhere arrived from a similar comparison of the fossil floras of the De- vonian and Carboniferous periods in America. 408 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. The second leading point to which I would direct attention is the relative value of land ice and water-borne ice as causes of geological change in the Post-pliocene. On this subject I have for the last sixteen years constantly maintained that moderate view which has been that of Sir Roderick Murchison and Sir Charles Lyell, that the Post-pliocene subsidence and refrigera- tion produced a state of our Continent in which the lower levels and at certain periods even the tops of the higher hills were submerged, under water filled every season with heavy ice de- rived from glaciers, and that at certain stages of submergence the hilly ranges were occupied with glaciers, sending down their ice to the level of the sea. I need not reiterate the arguments for this view ; but may content myself with a reference to the changes of opinion on the subject. The glacier theory of Agassiz and others may be said to have grown till, like the imaginary glaciers themselves, it overspread the earth. All northern Europe and America were covered with a mer-de-glace, moving to the southward and outward to the sea. This great ice-mantle not only removed stones and clay to immense distances, and glaciated and striated the whole surface, but it cut out great lake basins and fiords, ground even the tops of the highest hills, and accounted for everything otherwise difiicult in the superfi- cial contour of the land. It was even transferred to Brazil, and employed to excavate the valley of the Amazon. But this was its last feat, and it has recently been melting away under the warmth of discussion until it is now but a shadow of its former self. I may mention a few of the facts which have contributed to this result. It has been found that the glacial Boulder-clays are in many cases marine. Cirques and other Alpine valleys, once supposed to be the work of glaciers, are now known to have been produced by aqueous denudation. Great lakes, like those of America, supposed to be ihexplicable except by glacier erosion, have been found to admit of being otherwise accounted for. The transport of boulders and direction of striation have been found to conflict with the theory of continental glaciation, or to require too extravagant suppositions to account for them in that way. Greenland, at one time supposed to be a modern example of an ice-clad continent, has been found to be merely a mass of rocky hills and table-lands with local glaciers. The relation of Green- land to Baffin's Bay and Davis Straits, proves to be similar to that which may have obtained between the Laurentide hills and No. •!.] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 409 the submerged valley of the St. Lawrence. Lastly, the power attributed to glaciers as eroding agents, has been found to be altogether fallacious. I was surprised, in visiting the x\lps in 1865, to find that this boasted erosive power was little else than a myth; and I see that since that time many other observers have arrived at similar conclusions. I have recently seen a very sensible view of this question in a popular book by the well- known Alpine explorer, Whymper, of which I may quote the concluding paragraph, as precisely stating my own view as ex- pressed in the Canadian Naturalist in 1866: " Tf I were asked whether the action of glaciers upon rocks should be considered as chiefly destructive or conservative, I should answer without hesitation principally as conservative. It is destructive certainly to a limited extent ; but like a mason who dresses a column that is to be afterwards polished, the glacier removes a small portion of the stone on which it works in order that the rest may be more effectually preserved."* Some of the ablest of the advocates of the action of continen- tal glaciers have recently in my opinion contributed largely to the overthrow or modification of the theory. I may refer to two examples. Prof. Dana has given the coup de grace to the American con- tinental glacier by his paper in the No. of Silliman's American Journal for November, 1871. In this paper he affirms that '' the idea of a central glacier source for the continent is without foundation," so that it comes to be a question of local glaciers. He demands, however, one very large glacier of this kind. South- east striae occur on the mountains of New England to a height of 5000 to 5200 feet above the sea. A glacier to make these must, as he admits, have moved from a higher level. But N.W. of these striated mountains lie the valley of Lake Champlain and the great plain of the St. Lawrence, the latter with S. W. striae at right angles to those on the mountains. Still farther in the same direction is the valley of the Ottawa, and between this and the great low region of Hudson's Bay is only the Laureutian watershed of about 1500 feet high. From this must have flowed the glacier which passed over the tops of the White Mountains. In order to effect this result, it is necessary to suppose an elevation of the Hudson's Bay watershed in the Post-pliocene period to at least * Whymper, " Scrambles amongst the Alps," 410 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. 4,500 feet above its present height, and considering the uneven nature of the intervening country this is far too little. From this imaginary plateau 6000 to 7000 feet high, flowed a glacier over an intervening valley at least 5000 feet deep and thence over the Green and White Mountains. The glacier must con- sequently have been itself at least 7000 to 8000 feet thick. Farther "on nearing the St. Lawrence the lower part of its mass yielded to the impulse of gravity according to the slopes of this transverse valley, so that along this valley only .southwest scratches were made." But the southwest scratches of the St. Lawrence valley run from Labrador to the lake region and beyond, and have been produced by a force acting from the northeast, so that the actual fact must have been the flowing of a transverse glacier under the other up the slope of the country, then on the hypothesis probably greater than at present. But the whole assumption of an unequal elevation of the continent, 80 as to give a mountain region of the required elevation is des- titute of proof ; and not only so but contrary to the observed facts, which indicate very equable movements of elevation and depression as high at least as the terraces and raised beaches extend. In short, while our continental glacialists demand a glacier that shall move up the St. Lawrence valley and over the Niagara escarpment into Lake Erie, they also demand tlie crea- tion of a mountain north of the St. Lawrence, high enough to enable a glacier to glide from it over the White Mountains. These extravagant assumptions are fatal to their theory, and shew that they will be driven to have recourse to floating ice to explain a large part at least of the phenomena. Mr. J. Geikie, one of the most stubborn of land glacialists, is doing a similar service to the cause of truth, in a series of articles now appearing in the London Geological Magazine. He can- didly admits that the " evidence which has been accumulating during recent years will compel us to modify materially" the views of the extreme glacialists. He further admits that the Boulder-clay or till contains stratified gravel, clay and sand, with marine shells. He still maintains that the Boulder -clay proper is moraine matter produced on land, though there is evidence that this Boulder-clay as well as the stratified beds included in it, sometimes at least holds marine shells. He further seems to maintain that Boulder-clay proper, being an unstratified deposit, cannot be of marine origin, though this assumption is contro- No. 4.] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 411 verted, first, by the fact that clays full of stones and boulders contain marine shells, and in Canada at least, the boulders im- beded in such hard chiys of the nature of till, often have Bryozoa and Acorn-shells attached to them ; and, secondly, by the fact that the clays holding numerous boulders sometimes are stratified. Holding, however, his peculiar views about the Boulder-clay, Mr. Geikie must account for it by land glaciers, and the facts, according to him, shew that these could not have been merely a number of small local glaciers, but a general mer de glace. To reconcile this with the occurrence of the marine beds, he is obliged to have recourse to a series of cold and warm periods, and of emergences and submergences, some of them of sufficient duration to enable the country to be occupied with forests and with terrestrial mammalia. Thus it becomes necessary to exaggerate the duration of the glacial period, and indeed to invoke the aid, not of one glacial period, but of many, separated from each other by long periods of ameliorated climate. All this would be avoided by at once admitting the existence of marine Boulder-clays, and endeavouring to separate these either by their fossils or by their chemical and mechanical character from the glacial moraines, which I have no doubt will be found in Scotland as in North America to belong merely to local glaciers flowing in the existing valleys. The kames or eskers, which used both in Scotland and this country to be confounded with moraine ridges, Mr. Geikie now, with all other good geologists, regards as marine, though he attributes some of them to an older date than that held by Home and others. My general conclusion on this subject is therefore precisely what it was many years ago, and that on which I have proceeded throughout this paper ; namely, that we have in Canada evid- ence of a glacial period in which all the hilly ranges above water, were covered with snow and had glaciers in their valleys ; these glaciers terminating and giving off" icebergs at the mouths of the valleys, where these opened on the plain of the St. Lawrence, then under water. In the earlier part of the period the elevated land of the Pliocene epoch gradually sunk under the waters, and the remainder of it became refrigerated and covered with snow and ice. At the period of greatest subsidence, nearly all the hills were submerged, and heavy ice from the north ground over their summits ; while the upper part of the Boulder-clay and the lower beds of the Leda clay were deposited in the valleys. 412 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. As the land rose again, ice-clad hills returned, and new though perhaps less extensive glaciers were formed, and fresh crops of boulders were deposited in the shallowing seas of the Saxicava sand period. Snow still exists throughout the summer in the higher ravines of the White Mountains, and on the hills of La- brador, and a subsidence of a few hundred feet in the valley of the St, Lawrence and the country to the southward, would suf- fice to restore them to the condition of snow-clad hills giving off icebergs from their bases, so near are we yet to the glacial period ; and so little did it really differ from that condition of the continent which still exists. I do not here enter into the question of possible astronomical causes of refrigeration suggested by Croll and others. These may have been influential both with reference to changes of level and of temperature ; but I believe the changes of level are sufl&cient to account for the observed facts. On my return from Europe in 1866, 1 endeavoured in a popu- lar lecture, printed in Vol. III. N. S. of the Canadian Natural- ist, and entitled comparisons of the " Icebergs of Belleisle and the Glaciers of Mont Blanc," to picture the condition of Post- pliocene Canada. I may refer to this paper as more fully stat- ing my conclusions on the subject, and shall close this summary of the results of sixteen years' work in the Post-pliocene, with two extracts referring to the nature of the action of glaciers and the probable state of Post-pliocene Canada. " Glaciers are mills for grinding and triturating rock. The pieces of rock in the moraine are, in the course of their move- ment, crushed agaiast one another and the sides of the valley, and are cracked and o-rouud as if in a crushiDo;-mill. Farther, the stones on the surface of the glacier are ever falling into cre- vasses, and thus reach the bottom of the ice, where they are further ground against one another and the floor of rock. In the movement of the 2,lacier these stones seem in some cases to come again to the surfiice, and their remains are finally discharged in the terminal moraine, which i^ the waste-heap of this great mill. The fine material which has been produced, the flour of the mill, so to speak, becomes diffused in the water which is constantly flowing from beneath the glacier, and for this reason all the streams flowing from glaciers are turbid with whitish sand and mud. " The Arve which drains the glaciers of the north side of Mont Blanc, carries its burden of mud into the Rhone, which No. 4.] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 413 sweeps it, with the simihir material of many other Alpine streams, into the Mediterranean, to aid in filling up the bottom of that sea, whose blue waters it discolours for miles from the shore, and to increase its own ever enlarging delta which encroaches on the sea at the rate of about half a mile per century. The upper waters of the Rhone, laden with similar material, are filling up the Lake of Geneva ; and the great deposit of ' loess' in the alluvial plain of the Rhine, about which Gaul and German have contended since the dawn of European history, is of similar orio-in. The mass of material which has thus been carried ofi" from the Alps, would suffice to build up a great mountain chain. Thus by the action of ice and water — " The mountain falling cometh to naught And the rock is removed out of its place." " Many observers who have commented on these facts have taken it for granted that the mud thus sent off from glaciers, and which is so much greater in amount than the matter remaining in their moraines, must be ground from the bottom of the glacier valleys, and hence have attributed to these glaciers great power of cutting out and deepening their valleys. But this is evidently an error, just as it would be an error to suppose the flour of a grist-mill ground out of the mill-stones. Glaciers it is true groove and striate and polish the rocks over which they move, and especially those of projecting points and slight elevations in their beds, but the material which they grind up is principally derived from the exposed frost-bitten rocks above them, and the rocky floor under the 2;lacier is merely the nether mill-stone against which these loose stones are crushed. The glaciers in short can scarcely be regarded as cutting agents at all, in so far as the sides and bottoms of their beds are concerned, and in the valleys which the old glaciers have abandoned, it is evident that the torrents which have succeeded them have far greater cutting power." " In conclusion, I would wish it to be distinctly understood, that I do not doubt that at the time of the greatest post-pliocene submergence of Eastern America, at which time [ believe the greater part of the boulder clay was formed, and the more im- portant striation effected, the higher hills then standing as islands would be capped with perpetual snow, and through a great part of the year surrounded with heavy field and barrier 414 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. VI. ice, and that in these hills there might be glaciers of greater or less extent. Further it should be understood that I regard the boulder clays of the St. Lawrence valley as of different ages, ranging from the early post-pliocene to that at present forming in the gulf of St. Lawrence. Further, that this boulder clay shows in every place where I have been able to examine it, evidence of sub-aquatic accumulation, in the presence of marine shells or in the unweathered state of the rocks and minerals en- closed in it, conditions which, in my view, preclude any reference of it to glacier action, except possibly in some cases to that of glaciers stretching from the land over the margin of the sea, and forming under water a deposit equivalent in character to the ' boue glaciare' of the bottom of the Swiss glaciers. But such a deposit must have been local, and would not be easily distin- guishable from the marine boulder clay. I have not had oppor- tunities to study the boulder clay of Scotland, which in character and relations so closely resembles that of Canada, but I confess several of the facts stated by Scottish Geologists lead me to infer that much of what they regard as of sub-aerial origin must really be marine, though whether deposited by ice-bergs or by the fronts of glaciers terminating in the sea, I do not pretend to determine. It must however be observed that the antecedent probability of a glaciated condition is much greater in the case of Scotland than in that of Canada, from the high northern latitude of the former, its more hilly character, and the circumstance that its present exemption from glaciers is due to what may be termed exceptional and accidental geographical conditions; more espe- cially to the distribution of the waters of the Gulf stream, which might be changed by a comparatively small subsidence in Central America. To assume the former existence of irlaciers in a country in north latitude 66°, and with its highest hills, under the present exceptionally favourable conditions, snow-capped dur- ing most of the year, is a very different thing from assuming a covering of continental ice over wide plains more than ten degrees farther south, and in which, even under very unfavourable geo- graphical accidents, no snow can endure the summer sun, even in mountains several thousand feet high. Were the plains of North America submerged and invaded by the cold Arctic currents, the Gulf stream being at the same time turned into the Pacific, the temperature of the remaining North American land would be greatly diminished ; but under these circumstances the climate No. 4.] DAWSON — POST-PLIOCENE. 415 of Scotland would necessarily be reduced to the same condition with that of South Greenland or Northern Labrador. As we know such a submer2;ence of the land to have occurred in the Post-pliocene period, it does not seem necessary to have recourse to any other cause for either side of the Atlantic. It would, Iiowever, be a very interesting point to determine, whether in the Post-pliocene period the greatest submergence of America coin- cided with the greatest submergence of Europe, or otherwise. It is quite possible that more accurate information on this point might remove some present difficulties. I think it much to be desired that the many able observers now engaged on the Post- pliocene of Europe, would at least keep before their minds the probable effects of the geographical conditions above referred to, and enquire whether a due consideration of these would not allow them to dispense altogether with the somewhat extravagant theories of glaciation now agitated." It is hardly necessary to add that I hold and have endeavoured to prove by modern facts, in the Memoirs above referred to, that heavy icebergs borne by powerful currents, are potent agents in the production of striated surfaces and glaciated stones, as well as in transporting boulders, and that cold ocean currents are powerful eroding agents, especially when aided by heavy ice. Witness the Straits of Belle-Isle in modern times. Mr Vaushan, for many years Superintendent of the Lighthouse at that place, states that for ten icebergs which enter the straits fifty drift to the southward, yet he records that on the 30th of May, 1858, he counted in the Strait of Belle-Isle 49G bergs, the least of them sixty feet in height, some of them half a mile long and two hun- dred feet high. Only one-eighth of the volume of floating ice appears above water, and many of these great bergs may thus touch the ground in a depth of thirty fathoms or more, so that if we imagine four hundred of them moving up and down under the influence of the current, oscillating slowly with the motion of the sea, and grinding on the rocks and stone-covered bottom at all depths from the centre of the channel, we may form some conception of the effects of these huge polishers of the sea-floor. If this memoir had not already extended to too great leno-th, I could have wished to notice the evidence as to the existence of ice-action in more ancient periods than the Post-pliocene. I 416 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. would now merely state my belief that some of tbe consid- erations which render it necessary to invoke the action of frost and ice in the Post-pliocene period, apply also to the origin of some rocks of much higher antiquity, Ramsay has already noticed this in the case of the Permian conglomerates of England. In Canada an instance occurs in the cono-lomerate with boulders two feet in diameter, found in the Lower Silurian of Maimanse, Lake Superior,* A still more remarkable case is that of the New Glasgow conglomerate in the coal formation of Nova Scotia, which seems to be a o-ijrantic esker, on the outside of which large travelled boulders were deposited, probably by drift ice, while in the swamps within, the coal flora flourished and fine mud and coaly matter were accumulated. f A second indication of the existence of intense frost in ancient geological periods, is aff"orded by the occurrence of angular frag- ments of hard rocks cemented together. Such beds of angular fragments and chips, occur locally at various horizons, for ex- ample in the Upper Silurian and Lower Carboniferous in Nova Scotia, and the material of which they are composed seems pre- cisely similar to that which is at present produced by the disin- tegrating action of frost on hard and especially schistose and jointed rocks. Such deposits may, I think, fairly be regarded as evidence of somewhat intense winter cold. Supplementary Note, — A visit to Nova Scotia while these sheets were going through the press enables me to add the follow- ing facts: (1.) The discovery by Mr, Gr. F. Matthews of shells of Tellina Groenlandica in the Post-pliocene gravel at Horton Bluff, Nova Scotia. (2.) The occurrence of Laureutian boul- ders, probably from Labrador, in the Carboniferous region of Nova Scotia. I may specially mention a very fine boulder of Labradorite near the mouth of Carribou River, Pictou County. In Nova Scotia, however, as well as in Prince Edward Island, native stones predominate in the lower Boulder-clay, and the foreign blocks appear more toward the surface ; where also, in many cases the greater part of the blocks derived from neigh- bouring heights are collected. I had occasion often to notice the fact, referred to above, of drift from the south as well as from the north, and also the great frequency in the boulder deposits of glaciated stones. * Can, Nat, II, p, 6. f Acadian Geology, p. 324. No. 4.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 417 HISTORY OF THE NAMES CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN IN GEOLOGY. By T. Sterry Hunt, LL.D., F.R.S. (^Concluded from page 312). III. Cambrian and Silurian Rocks in North America. In accordance with our plan we now proceed to sketch the his- tory of the lower paleozoic rocks in North America. While European geologists were carrying out the researches which have been described in the first and second parts of this paper, Ame- rican investigators were not idle. The geological studies of Eaton led the way to a systematic survey of the state of New York, the results of which have been the basis of most of the subsequent geological work in eastern North America, and which was begun by legislative enactment in 1836. The state was divided into four districts, the work of examining and finally reporting upon which was committed to as many geologists. The first or south- eastern district was undertaken by Mather, the second or north- eastern by Emmons, the third or central by Vanuxem, and the fourth or western by James Hall ; the paleontology of the whole being left to Conrad, and the mineralogy to Beck. After various annual reports the final results of the survey appeared in 1842. The whole series of fossiliferous rocks known, from the basal or Potsdam sandstone to the coal-formation, was then described as the New York system. At that time the published researches of British geologists furnished the means of comparison between the organic remains found in the rocks of New York, and those then known to exist in the paleozoic strata of Great Britain. Prof. Hall was thus enabled in his Geology of the Fourth District of New York, to declare, from the study of its fossils, that the New York system included the Devonian of Phillips, the Silurian of Murchison, and the Cambrian of Sedgwick ; meaning by the latter the Upper Cambrian, or Bala group, which alone was then known to be fossi- liferous. From the evidence then before him, he concluded that the Upper Cambrian was represented in the New York system Vol. VI. T . No. 4. 418 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. Vl. by the whole of the rocks from the base of the Utica slate, downward, with the probable exception of the Potsdam sand- stone; while he conceived, partly on lithological grounds, that the Utica and Hudson-E,iver groups represented the Llandeilo and Caradoc, or the Lower Silurian of Murchison [loc, cit. pages 20, 29, 31]. The origin of the Cambrian and Silurian con- troversy, and the errors by which the Llandeilo and a part of the Caradoc had by Murchison been classed as a series distinct from the Bala group, were not then known ; but in a note to this report [page 20,] Hall informs us of the declaration of Murchison, already quoted from his address of 1842, that the Cambrian, so far as then known, could not, on paleontological grounds, be dis- tinguished from his Lower Silurian. Emmons meanwhile had examined in eastern New York and western New England a series of fossiliferous rocks, which on lithological and stratigraphical grounds, he regarded as older than any in the New York system ; a view which had been previously maintained by Eaton. Holding, with Hall, that the lower members of the New York system were the equivalents of the Upper Cambrian of Sedgwick, he looked upon the fossiliferous rocks which he placed beneath them, as the representatives of the Lower Cambrian. By this name, as we have seen, Sedgwick, in 1838, designated all those uncrystalline rocks of North Wales which he subsequently divided into Lower and Middle Cam- brian, and which lie beneath the base of the Bala group. When Murchison, in 1842, in his so often quoted declaration, asserted that " the term Cambrian must cease to be used in zoological classification, it being in that sense synonymous with Lower Si- lurian," he was speaking only on paleontological grounds, and, disregardins: the o-reat Lower and Middle Cambrian divisions of Sedgwick, had reference only to the Upper Cambrian. This how- ever was overlooked by Emmons, who feeling satisfied that the sedimentary rocks which he had examined in eastern New York were distinct from those which he, with Hall, regarded as corres- ponding to the Bala group or Upper Cambrian, (the Lower Silurian of Murchison), and probably equivalent to the inferior portions of Sedgwick's Cambrian ; and supposing that the latter term was henceforth to be effaced from geology (as indeed was attempted shortly after, in the copy of Sedgwick's map published in 1844 by the Geological Society) devised for these rocks the name of the Taconic system, as synonymous with the Lower No. 4.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 419 (and Middle) Cambrian of Sedgwick. These conclusions were set forth by him in 1842, in his report on the Geology of the Northern District of New York [page 162]. See also his Agricul- ture of New York [I, 49] the fifth chapter of which, " On the Taconic system," was also published separately in 1844 ; when the presence of distinctive organic remains in the rocks of this series was first announced. Meanwhile to Prof. Hall, after the completion of the survey, had been committed the task of studying and describing the organic remains of the state, and in 1847 appeared the first volume of his great work on the " Paleontology of New York." Since 1842 he had been enabled to examine more fully the or- ganic remains of the lower rocks of the New York system, and to compare them with those of the old world ; and in the Intro- duction to the volume just mentioned [page xix] he announced the important conclusion that the New York system itself con- tained an older fauna than the Upper Cambrian of Sedgwick. According to Hall, the organic forms of the Calciferous and Chazy formations had not yet been found in Europe, and our compari- son with European fossiliferous rocks must commence with the Trenton group. He however excepted the Potsdam sandstone, which already, in 1842, he had conceived to be below the Upper Cambrian of Sedgwick, and now regarded as the probable equi- valent of the Obolus or Ungulite grit of St. Petersburg. Thus Emmons, in 1842, asserted, on lithological and stratigraphical grounds, the existence, beneath the base of the New York system, of a lower and unconformable series of rocks, in which, in 1844, he announced the discovery of a distinctive fauna. Hall, on his part, asserted in 1842, and more fully in 1847, that the New York system itself held an older fauna than that hitherto known in the British rocks. It is not necessary to recall in this place the details of the long and unfortunate Taconic controversy, which I have recently dis- cussed in my address before the American Association for the Advancement of Science in August, 1871. It is however to be remarked that Hall, in common with all other American geolo- gists, followed Henry J). Rogers in opposing the views of Em- mons, whose Taconic system was supposed to represent either the whole or a part of the Champlain division of the New York system ; which included, as is well known, all of the fossiliferous rocks up to the base of the Oneida conglomerate (and also this 420 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. latter, according to Emmons) ; thus comprehending both the first and the second paleozoic f\mna ; as shown in the table on page 312. Emmons, misled by stratigraphical and lithological considera- tions, complicated the question in a singular manner, which scarcely finds a parallel except in the history of Murchison's Silurian sections. Completely inverting, as I have elsewhere shown, the order of succession in his Taconic system, estimated by him at 30,000 feet, he placed near the base of the lower divi- sion of the system the Stockbridge or Eolian limestone, including the white marbles of Vermont; which, by their organic remains, have since been by Billings found to belong to the Levis forma- tion. A large portion of the related rocks in western Vermont and elsewhere, which afibrd a fauna now known to be far more ancient than that of the Lower Taconic just referred to, and as low if not lower than anything in the New York system, were, by Emmons, then placed partly near the summit of the Upper Taconic, and partly not only above the whole Taconic system, but above the Champlain division of the New York system. Thus we find in 1842, in his Report on the Geology of the Northern District of New York (where Emmons defined his views on the Taconic system), that he placed above this latter horizon, both the green sandstone of Sillery near Quebec, and the red sandrock of western Vermont, (which he then regarded as the representatives of the Oneida and the Medina sandstones,) and described the latter as made up from the ruins of Taconic rocks [pages 124, 282]. In 1844-1846, in his Report on the Agri- culture of New York [T. 119], he however adopted a difi"erent view of the red sandrock, assigning it to the Calciferous ; and in 1855, in his " American Geology" [ii. 128], it was regarded as in part Calciferous and in part Potsdam. In 1848 Prof. C. B. Adams, then director of the Geological Survey of Vermont, argued strongly against these latter views, and maintained that the red sandrock directly overlaid the shales of the Hudson- River group and corresponded to the Medina and Clinton forma- tions of the New York system. [Amer. Jour. Sci. II, v. 108.] He had before this time discovered in this sandrock, besides what he considered an Atri/pa, abundant remains of a trilobite, which Hall, in 1847, referred to the genus ConocepJialus {Cono- coryphe), remarking at the same time that inasmuch as this genus was (at that time) only described as occurring in No. 4.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 421 '' graywacke in Germany" and elsewhere, no conclusions could be drawn from these fossils as to the geological horizon of the rocks in question, [Ibid. II, xxxiii, 371.] In September, 1861, however, Mr. Billings, after an examination of the rocks in ques- tion, pronounced in favor of the later opinion of Emmons, declaring the red sandrock near Highgate Springs, Vermont, containing Conoceplialus and Theca^ to belong to the base of the second fauna " if not indeed a little lower," and to be "some- where near the horizon of the Potsdam." [Ibid. II, xxxii, 232.] The dark colored fossiliferous shales which were asserted, both by Adams and by Emmons, to underlie this red sandrock, were, by the former, as we have seen, regarded as belonging to the Hudson-River group, while by the latter they were described as an upper member of the Taconic system ; which was here declared to be unconformably overlaid by the red sandrock, a member of the New York system. These slates, a few years before, had afforded some trilobites, which after remaining in the hands of Prof. Hall for two years or more, were in 1859, described by him in the 12th " Report of the Regents of the University of New York," as Oleuus Thampsoni and 0. Vermontana. He soon however found them to constitute a distinct genus, for which he proposed the name of Barrandia, but finding this name pre- occupied, suggested in 1861, in the 14th "Regents' Report," that of OlcneUus, which was subsequently adopted by Billings, in 1865. [Paleozoic Fossils, pages 365, 419.] In 1860, Emmons, in his "Manual of Geology," described the same species, but placed them in the genus Paradoxides, as P. Tliompsoni and P. Vermontana. Hall had already, in 1847, in the first volume of his Paleontology of New York, referred to Olenus the Elllpto- cephalus asajjhoides of Emmons, and also a fragment of another trilobite from Saratoga Lake ; both of which were described as belonging to the Hudson-River group of the New York system, or to a still higher horizon. The reasons for this will appear in the sequel. The EUiptoaphahis, with another trilobite named by Emmons Atops, (referred by Hall to Calymene^ and subse- quently, by Billings to Conocoryplie,') occurs at Greenwich, New York. These were by Emmons, in his essay on the Taconic system ^in 1844), described as characteristic of that system of rocks. A copy of the Regent's Report for 1859 having been sent by Billings to Barrande. this eminent paleontologist, in a letter 422 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. addressed to Prof. Bronn of Heidelberg, July 16, 1860 [Amer. Jour. Sci. II, xxxi, 212], called attention to the trilobites therein figured, and declared that no paleontologist familiar with the trilobites of Scandinavia would " have hesitated to class them among the species of the primordial fauna, and to place the schists enclosing them in one of the formations containing this fauna. Such is my profound conviction, etc." The letter con- taining this statement had already appeared in the American Journal of Science for March, 1861, but Mr. Billings in his note just referred to, on the fossils of Highgate, in the same Journal for September of that year, makes no allusion to it. In March, 1862, however, he returns to the subject of the sandrock, in a more lengthy communication [Ibid II, xxxiii. 100), and after correcting some omissions in his former note, alludes in the fol- lowing language to Mr. Barrande, and to the expressed opinion of the latter, just quoted, with regard to the fossils in question and the rocks containing them : " I must also state that Bar- rande first determined the age of the slates in Georgia, Vermont, holding F. Thonipsoni and P. Vermontanay He adds " at the time I wrote the note on the Highgate fossils it was not known that these slates were conformably interstratified with the red sandrock. This discovery was made afterwards by the Bev. J. B. Perry and Dr. G. M. Hall of Swanton." Mr. Billings now blames me [Canadian Naturalist, new series, vi, 318] for having written in my address of last year, with regard to the Georgia trilobites, first described as Olenus by Prof. Hall, that Barrande " called attention to their primordial character, and thus led to a knowledge of their true stratigraphi- cal horizon." I had always believed that the letter of Barrande and the explicit declaration of Mr. Billings, just quoted, con- tained the whole truth of the matter. My attention has since been called to a subsequent note by Mr. Billings in May, 1862, [Ibid II, xxxiii, 421] in which, while asserting that Emmons had already assigned to these rocks a greater age than the New York system, he mentions that in sending to Barrande, in the spring of 1860, the Ileport of Prof. Hall on the Georgia fossils, he alluded to their primordial character, and suggested that they might belong to what Mr. Barrande has called ' a colony' in the rocks of the second fauna. This is also stated in a note by Sir William Logan in the preface to the Geology of Canada [page viii.] As the genus Olenus, to which Prof. Hall^had referred No. 4.] HUNT- — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 423 the fossils in question, was at that time (1860) well-known to belong, both in Great Britain and in Scandinava, to the primordial fauna, Mr. Barrande does not seem to have thought it neces- sary in his correspondence to refer to the very obvious remark of Mr. Billings. Mr. Billings further showed in his paper in March, 1862, that fossils identical with those of the Georfjia slates had been found by him in specimens collected by Mr. Richardson of the Geologi- cal Survey of Canada in the summer of 1861, on the Labrador coast, along the strait of Belisle : where Olenellus (^Paradoxides) Thoinpsoni and 0. Vermontana were found with Conocorijphe (Conoceplialus) in strata which were by Billings referred to the Potsdam gioup. [See for the further history of these fossils the Geology of Canada, pages 866, 955, and Pal. Fossils of Canada, pages 11, 419.] The interstratification of the dark-colored fossiliferous shales holding Olenellus with the red sandrock of Vermont, announced by Mr. Billings, was further confirmed by Sir William Logan in his account of the section at Swanton, Vermont [Geology of Canada, 281]. They were there declared to occur about 500 feet from the base of a series of 2200 feet of strata, consisting chiefly of red sandy dolomites (the so-called sandrock) contain- ing Conocephalus throughout, while the shaly beds held in ad- dition, the two species of Paradoxides (^Olenellus) and some brachiopods. These beds, like those of Labrador, were referred by Logan and by Billings to the Potsdam group. The conclusions here announced were of great importance for the history of the Taconic controversy. The trilobites of primordial type, from Georgia, Vermont, which by Emmons were placed in the Taconic system, lying unconformably beneath a series of rocks belonging to the lower part of the New York system, were now declared to belong to the red sandrock group, a member of this overlying system. Much has been said of these fossils, as if they furnished in some way a vindication of the views of Emmons, and of the Taconic system ; a conclusion which can only be deduced from a misconception of the facts in the case. Emmons had, previous to 1860, on lithological and stratigraphical evidence alone, called the Georgia slates Taconic, and placed them unconformably beneath the red sandrock. If now both he and Billings were right in referring the red sandrock to the Calcifcrous and Potsdam for- mations, and if the stratigraphical determination of Messrs. Perry 424 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. and G. M. Hall, confirmed by those of Logan, were correct, viz : that the trilobites in question occur not in a system of strata lying unconformably beneath the red sandrock, but in beds inter- calated with the red sandrock itself, it is clear that these trilo- bites must belong not to the Taconic, but to the New York system. We shall return to the question of the age of these rocks. We have seen that Prof. James Hall, in 1847, and again in 1859, referred trilobites regarded by him as species of Olenus to the Hudson-River group, or in other words to the summit of the second paleozoic founa, while it is now well known that they are characteristic of the first fauna. In this reference, in 1847, Prof. Hall was justified by the singular errors which we have already pointed out in the works of Hisinger on the geology of Scandi- navia. In his AnteeJcningar, in 1828, while the colored map and accompanying sections show the alum-slates with Paradoxides to lie beneath, and the clay-slates with graptolites, above the orthoceratite-limestone, the accompanying colored legend, designed to explain the map and sections, gives these two slates with the numbers 3 and 4, as if they were contiguous and beneath the limestone^ which is numbered 5. The student who, in his per- plexity, turned from this to the later work of Hisinger, his Lethaea Suecica, found the two groups of slates, as before, placed in juxtaposition, but assigned, together, to a position above the orthoceratite-limestone. Thus, in either case, he would be led to the conclusion that in Scandinavia the alum-slates with OJenus^ Paradoxides and Conocejjhdus (Conocoryphe) wer*^ closely asso- ciated with the graptolitic shales ; and, upon the authority of the latter work, that the position of both of these was there above the orthoceratite-limestones, and at the summit of the second fauna. The graptolitic shales of Scandinavia were already identified with those of the Utica and Hudson-River formations of the New York system. The red sandrock of Vermont, containing Conocephalus, had ^een, both by Emmons and Adams, alike on lithological and stratigraphical grounds, referred to the still higher Medina sandstone ; a view which, as we have seen, was still main- tained and strongly defended by Adams. This was in 1847, and Angelin's classification of the transition rocks of Scandinavia, fixing the position of the various trilobitic zones, did not appear until 1854. Prof. Hall had therefore at this time the stronirest reasons for assigning the rocks containing Olenus to the summit of the second fauna. Before we can understand his reasons for No. 4.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 425 maintaining a similar view in 1859, we must notice the history of geological investigation in eastern Canada. So early as 1827, Dr. Bigsby, to whom North American geology owes so much, had given us [Proc. Geol. Soc. I, 37] a careful description of the geology of Quebec and its vicinity. He there found resting directly upon the ancient gneiss, a nearly horizontal dark colored couchiferous limestone, having sometimes at its base a calcareous conglomerate, and well displayed on the north shore of the St. Lawrence at Montmorenci and Beauport. He distinguished moreover a third group of rocks, described by him as a " slaty series composed of shale and graywacke, occasionally passing into a brown limestone, and alternating with a calcareous conglom- erate in beds, some of them charged with fossils * ^' * -i^ derived from the conchiferous limestone." (This fossiliferous conglomerate contained also fragments of clay-slate.) From all these circumstances Bigsby concluded that the flat conchiferous limestones were older than the highly inclined graywacke series ; which latter was described as forming the ridge on which Quebec stands, the north shore to Cape Rouge, the island of Orleans, and the southern or Point-Levis shore of the St. Lawrence ; where besides trilobites, and the fossils in the conglomerates, he noticed what he called vegetable impressions, supposed to be fucoids. These were the graptolites which, nearly thirty years later, were studied, described and figured for the Geological Survey of Ca- nada by Prof. James Hall ; who has shown that two of the spe- cies from this locality were described and figured under the name of fucoids by Ad. Brongniart, in 1828. [Geol. Sur. Canada, Decade II, page 60.] Bigsby, in 1827, conceived that the lime- stones of the north shore might belong to the carboniferous period, and noted the existence of what were called small seams of coal in the graywacke series of the south shore, which sub- stance I have since described in the Geology of Canada [page 525.] In 1842, the Geological Survey of Canada was begun by Sir William Logan, who in a Preliminary Report to the Government, in that year [page 19], says " of the relative age of the contorted rocks of Point Levis, opposite Quebec, I have not any good evi- dence, though I am inclined to the opinion that they come out from below the flat limestones of the St. Lawrence." He how- ever subsequently adds, in a foot-note, " the accumulation of evidence points to the conclusion that the Point Levis rocks are 426 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. superior to the St. Lawrence limestones." In 1845, Captain, now Admiral Bayfield, maintained the same view, fortifying himself by the early observations of Bigsby, and expressing the opinion that the flat limestones of Montmorenci and Beauport passed beneath the graywacke series. These limestones, from their fos- sils, were declared to be low down in the Silurian, and identical with those which had been observed at intervals along the north shore of the St. Lawrence to Montreal, [Geol. Journal, i. 455] the fossiliferous limestones of which were then well known to belong to the Trenton group of the New York system. The graywacke series of Quebec, which was still supposed by Bay- field to hold in its conglomerates fossils from these limestones, was therefore naturally regarded as belonging to the still higher members of that system ; and, as we have seen, the green sand- stone near Quebec, a member of that series, had already in 1842, been regarded by Emmons as the representative of the Oneida or Shawangunk conglomerate, at the summit of the Hudson-River group of New York. It is to be noticed that immediately to the north-east of Que- bec, rocks undoubtedly of the age of the Utica and Hudson- Biver divisions overlie conformably the Trenton limestone, on the left bank of the St. Lawrence; while a few miles to the south-west, strata of the same age, and occupying a similar strati- graphical position, appear on both sides of the St. Lawrence, and are traced continuously from this vicinity to the valley of Lake Champlain. These moreover ofi"er such lithological resemblances to the so-called graywacke series of Quebec and Point Levis, (which extends thence some hundreds of miles north-eastward along the right bank of the St. Lawrence,) that the two series were readily confounded, and the whole of the belt of rocks along the south-east side of the St. Lawrence, from the valley of Lake Champlain to Gaspe, was naturally regarded as younger than the limestones of the Trenton group. It was in 1847 that Sir Wil- liam Logan commenced his examination of the rocks of this region, and in his report the next year [1848, page 58] we find him speaking of the continuous outcrop "of recognized rocks of the Hudson-River group from Lake Champlain along the south bank of the St. Lawrence to Cape Rosier." In his Report for 1850, these rocks were farther noticed as extending from Point L^vis south-west to the Richelieu, and north-east to Gaspe, [pages 19, 32]. They were described as consisting, in ascendin No. 4.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 427 sequence from the Trenton limestone and the Utica slate, of clay-slates and limestones, with graptolites and other fossils, followed by conglomerate-beds supposed to contain Trenton fossils, red and green shales and green sandstones; the details of the section being derived from the neighborhood of Que- bec and Point Levis, and from the rocks first described by Bigsby. As farther evidence with regard to the supposed horizon of these rocks, to which he subsequently (in I860,) gave the name of the Quebec group, we may cite a letter of Sir William Logan, dated November, 1861, [Amer. Jour. Sci. II, xxxiii, 106,] in which he says " In 1848 and 1849, founding myself upon the apparent superposition in Eastern Canada of what we now call the Quebec group, I enunciated the opinion that the whole series belonged to the Hudson-River group and its immediately succeeding formation ; a Leptmna very like L. sericea, and an Or this, very like 0. testudinaria, and taken by me to be these species, being then the only fossils found in the Canadian rocks in question. This view supported Prof. Hall in placing, as he had already done, the Olenus rocks of New York in the Hudson-River group, in accordance with Hisinger's list of Swedish rocks as given in the Lethcea Suecica in 1837, and not as he had previously given it." The concurrent evidence deduced from stratigraphy, from geographical distribution, from lithological and from paleontologi- cal characters, thus led Logan, from the first, to adopt the views already expressed by Bigsby, Emmons and Bayfield, and to assign the whole of the paleozoic rocks of the south-east shore of the St. Lawrence, below Montreal, to a position in the New York system above the Trenton limestone. While thus, as he says, founding his opinion on the stratigraphical evidence obtained in Eastern Canada, Logan was also influenced by the consideration that the rocks in question were continuous with those in western Vermont. Part of the rocks of this region had, as we have seen, originally been placed by Emmons at this horizon, while the otliers, referred by him to his Taconic system, were maintained by Henry D. Rogers to belong to the Hudson-River group ; a view which was adopted by Mather and by Hall, and strongly defended by Adams, at that time engaged in a Geological Survey of Vermont, with which in 1846 and 1847, the present writer was connected. As regards the subsequent paleontological discoveries in these 428 THE CANADIxlN NATURALIST. [VoL vi. rocks in Canada, it is to be said that the graptolites first noticed by Bigsby in 1827, were re-discovered by the Geological Survey, at Point Levis in 1854, and having been placed in the hands of Prof. James Hall, (who in that year first saw the rocks in ques- tion) were partially described by him in a communication to Sir W. E. Logan, dated April, 1855, and subsequently at length in 1858 [Report Geol. Survey for 1857, page 109, and Decade II.] They were new forms, it is true, but the horizon of the grap- tolites, both in New York and in Sweden, was the same as that already assigned by Logan to the Poiut-Levis rocks. Thus these fossils appeared to sustain his view, and they were accord- ingly described as belonging to the Hudson-River group. Up to 1856, no other organic remains than the graptolites and the two species of brachiopods noticed by Sir William Logan, were known to the Geological Survey as belonging to the Point Levis rocks; the trilobites long before observed by Bigsby not having been re-discovered. In 1856, the present writer, while engaged in a lithological study of the various rocks of Point Levis, found in the vicinity of the graptolitic shales, beds of what were described by him in 1857, [Report Geol. Surv. 1853- 56, page 465,] as " fine granular opaque lim*estones, weathering bluish-gray, and holding in abundance remains of orthoceratites, trilobites, and other fossils; which are replaced by a yellow- weathering dolomite." In these, which are probably what Bigsby had long before described as fossiliferous conglomerates, the dolomitic matter is so arranged as to suggest a resemblance to certain beds which are really conglomerate in character, and were, at the same time, described by me as interstratified with the fossiliferous limestones, and as holding pebbles of pure limestone, of dolomite, and occasionally of quartz and of argillite ;• the whole cemented by a yellow-weathering dolomite, and occa- sionally by a nearly pure carbonate of lime. [Ibid 466.] The included fragments of argillite, (previously noticed by Bigsby) which are greenish or purplish in color, with lustrous surfaces, are precisely similar to those which form great beds in the crys- talline schists of the Green Mountain series of the Appalachian hills, which extend in a north-east and south-west course along the south-eastern border of the rocks of the Quebec group. I conceive that these argillite fragments, (like those in the Potsdam conglomerate near Lake Champlain, referred to in my address of last year,) are derived from the ancient schists of the Appal- lachians. No. 4. J HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 429 This re-discovery of fossiliferous limestoucs at Point Levis led to farther exploration of the locality, and in 1857, and the following years, a large collection of trilobites, brachiopods, and other organic remains was obtained from these limestones by the Geological Survey of Canada. Mr. Billings, who in 1856, had been appointed paleontologist to the Geological Survey, at once commenced the study of these fossils from Point Levis, and at length arrived at the important conclusion that the organic remains there found, belonged not to the summit of the second fauna, but were to be assigned a posi- tion in the first or primordial fauna. This conclusion he com- municated to Mr, Barrande in a letter, dated July 12, 1860, [x\mer. Jour. Sci. II, xxxi, 220] and gave descriptions of many of the organic forms in the Canadian Naturalist for the same year. I have already alluded, in describing the rocks of Point Levis, to the peculiarities of aspect which probably led Dr. Bigsby, in 1827, to confound these fossiliferous limestones, pene- trated by dolomite, with the true dolomitic conglomerates asso- ciated with them, and helped him to suppose the fossils to be derived from the limestones of the north shore, now known to be younger rocks. This mistake was a very natural one at a time when comparative paleontology was unknown. Sir William Logan meanwhile made a careful stratigraphical examination of the rocks of Point Levis, and notwithstaudino- the peculiarities of the limestones which there contain the pri- mordial fauna, declared himself, in December, 1860, satisfied that " the fossils are of the age of the strata." In consequence of the discovery of Mr. Billings, Logan now proposed to separate from the Hudson-River group the graywacke series of Bigsby and Bayfield, and ascribed to it a much, greater antiquity ; regarding it as " a great development of strata about the horizon of the Chazy and Calciferous, brought to the surface by an overturn anticlinal fold, with a crack and a great dislocation run- ning along the summit," by which the rocks in question were "brought to overlap the Hudson-River formation." This serfes, to which was assigned a thickness of from 5000 to 7000 feet, he named the Quebec group, which included the green sandstones of Sillery, regarded as the summit, the fossiliferous limestones and graptolitic shales at the base, which afterwards received the name of the Levis formation, and a great interme- diate mass of barren shales and sandstones, called the Lauzon 430 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. formation. The first account of this chano-e in the stratisra- phical views of Logan occurs in his letter to Barrande, dated December 31st, 1860. [Amer. Jour. Sci. II, xxxi, 216.] This important distinction once established, it was found ne- cessary to draw a line from the St. Lawrence, near Quebec, to the vicinity of Lake Champlain, separating the true Hudson-River group, with its overlying Oneida or Medina rocks, on the north- west side, from the so-called Quebec group, on the south and east. This division was by Logan ascribed to a continuous dis- location, which had disturbed a great conformable paleozoic series, including the whole of the members of the New York system from the base of the Potsdam to the summit of the Hudson-River group, and, throughout the whole distance of 160 miles, had raised up the lower formations in a contorted and inclined attitude, and caused them to overlie in many cases the higher formations of the system. This dividing line was by Logan traced north-eastward through the island of Orleans, the waters of the lower St. Lawrence, and along the north shore of Gasp^ ; and south-westward through Vermont, across the Hud- son, as far at least as Virginia; separating, throughout, the rocks of the Quebec and Potsdam groups, with their primordial fauna, from those of the Trenton and Hudson River groups, with Jthe second fauna. This is shown in the geological map of eastern America from Virginia to the St. Lawrence, which appears in the Atlas to the Geology of Canada, published in 1865. In an earlier geological map published by Sir William Logan at Paris in 1855, before this distinction had been drawn, the region in question in Eastern Canada is colored partly as the Oneida formation, and partly as the Hudson-River group ; while in the accompanying text the Sillery sandstone is spoken of as the equivalent of the Shawangunk grit or Oneida conglo- merate of the New York system. [Esquisse Geologique du Canada; Logan and Sterry Hunt, Paris, 1855, page 51.] These rocks were by Logan traced southwards across the frontier of Canada, into Vermont, where they included the red sandrock and its associated slates; which were thus by Logan, as well as by Adams, looked upon as occupying a position at the summit of the second fauna. When therefore in 1859, Prof. Hall described the trilobites found in these slates in Georgia in Ver- mont, he referred them to the genus Olenus, whose primordial horizon in Europe was then well determined, but in deference to No. 4.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 431 the conclusions of Adams and of Logan, assigned them to a position at the summit of the Hudson-River group ; Hall him- self never having examined the region stratigraphically. [Amer. Jour. Sci. IT, xxxi, 221.] In justification of this position he appended to his description the following note, [Ibid, pages 213, 221 :] "In addition to the evidence heretofore possessed regarding the position of the slates containing the trilobites, I have the testimony of Sir W. E. Logan that the shales of this locality are in the upper part of the Hudson-River group, or forming part of a series of strata which he is inclined to rank as a distinct group, above the Hudson-River proper. It would be quite superfluous for me to add one word in sup- port of the opinion of the most able stratigraphical geologist of the American continent." Paleontology and stratigraphy here came into conflict, and it was not till in 1860, when Mr. Billings, in the face of the evidence adduced from the latter, asserted the primordial age of the Point L^vis fauna, that Sir William Logan attempted a new explanation of the stratigraphy of the region; declaring at the same time, that "from the physical structure alone no person would suspect the break which must exist in the neighborhood of Quebec ; and without the evidence of the fossils every one would be authorized to deny it." [Ibid, page 218.] The typical Potsdam sandstone of the New York system, as seen in the Ottawa basin in northern New York and the adja- cent parts of Canada, affords but a very meagre fauna, including two species of brachiopods, one or two gasteropods, and a single crustacean, Conocephalites (^Conocorypht) ininutus, found at Keeseville, New York. In 1852, however, David Dale Owen found and described an extensive fauna in Wisconsin, from rocks which were regarded as the equivalent of the Potsdam sandstone ; while the observations of Shumard in Texas, in 1861, and the latter ones of Hayden and Meek in the Black Hills, have since still further extended our knowledge of the distribution and the organic remains of the rocks which are supposed to represent, in the west, the Potsdam and Calciferous formations of the New York system. As early as 1842, Prof. Hall, in a comparison of the lower paleozoic rocks of New York with those of Great Britain, declared the Potsdam to be lower than the base of the Upper Cambrian or Bala group of Sedgwick. In 1847, as we have seen, 432 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. Vl. he extended this observation to the Calciferous and Chazy, both of which he placed below this horizon ; which until a year or two previous had been looked upon as the base of the paleozoic series in Great Britain, and was subsequently made the lower limit of the second fauna of Barrande. Although from these facts it was probable that these lower members of the New York system might correspond to the primordial fjiuna of Barrande, we still remained, in the lano;uao;e of Prof. Hall, without " the means of parallelizing our formations with those of Bohemia, by the f\iuna there known. The nearest approach to the type of the primordial trilobites was found in the Potsdam of the north- west, described by Dr. D. D. Owen ; but none of these had been generically identified with Bohemian forms, and the prevailing opinion, sanctioned as I have understood, by Mr. Barrande, was that the primordial fauna had not been discovered in this country until the re-discovery (in 1856) of Paradoxides Harlani at Braintree, Mass. The fragmentary fossils published in vol. I of the Paleontology of New York, and similar forms of the so-called Taconic system, were justly regarded as insufficient to warrant any conclusions." [Amer. Jour. Sci. II. xxxi, 225]. Such, accord- ing to Prof Hall, was the state of the question up to 1860. The Conocephalus, detected by him from the red sandrock of Ver- mont, in 1847, and subsequently recognized in Europe as an exclusively primordial type, seems to have been forgotten by Hall, and overlooked by others, until it was re-discovered in the sandrock by Billings in 1861. He had previously, in 1860, detected the same genus at Point Levis, together with Ario- nellus, and other purely primordial types. Associated with these, and with many other trilobites belonging to the second fauna, were found several species of Dikellocephalus and Menocephalus, genera first made known by Owen from the Potsdam of Wiscon- sin. It is by an error that Messrs, Harkness and Hicks, in a recent paper [Quar. Geol. Jour., xxvii, 395] have asserted that Owen, in 1852, found there, together with these genera, Conoce- phalus and Arionellus ; the history of the first discovery of these genera in America, being as above given. The limestones of Point Levis thus furnished what was hitherto wanting, a direct connectino; link between the fauna of the American Potsdam and the primordial zone of Bohemia. The history of the Faradoxldes Harlani, alluded to by Prof. Hall, is as follows: In 1834, Dr. Jacob Green received from Dr, No. 4.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 433 Kichard Harlan, the cast of a large trilobite occurring in a silicious slate, which was in the collection of Francis Alger, of Boston, and, it was supposed, might have come from Trenton Falls, New York. Dr. Green, who at once pointed out the fact that the rock was wholly unlike any found at this locality, declared the fossil to resemble greatly the Paradoxides Tessini, Brongn., — the former Entomolithus jmradoxus of Linnaeus, from Westrogothia, — and named the species P. Harlani. [Amer. Jour., Sci, I, xxv^ 336], In 1856, the attention of Prof. William B. Rogers was called to a locality of organic remains in Braiutree, on the border of Quincy, Massachusetts, where, on examination, he at once recognized the Paradoxides Harlani in a silicious slate similar to that of the original specimen. This was announced by him in a communication to the American Academy of Sciences [Proc, vol. iii], as a proof of the protozoic age of some of the rocks of eastern Massachusetts. Prof. Rogers then called attention to the fact that this genus of trilobites is characteristic of the pri- mordial fauna, and noticed that Barrande had already remarked that, from the casts of P. Harlani, in the London School of Mines, and the British Museum (which had been made from the original specimen, and distributed by Dr. Green), this species appeared to be identical with P. spinosus from Skrey in Bohemia. In 1858, Salter found in specimens sent to the Bristol Insti- tution, in England, by Mr. Bennett, of Newfoundland, from the promontory between St. Mary's and Placentia Bays, in the south- western part of the island, a large trilobite, described by him as Paradoxides Bennettil [Geol. Jour., xv, 554], which appears, according to Mr. Billings, to be identical with P. Harlani. On the same occasion Salter described under the name of Conoce- phalites antlqiiatuSj a trilobite from a collection of American fossils sent by Dr. Feuchtwanger of New York to the London Exhibition of 1851. This was said to occur in a boulder of brown sandstone from Georgia, and, as I have been informed by Dr. F., was found near the town of Columbus in that state. The slates of St. John, New- Brunswick, and its vicinity have recently yielded an abundant fauna, examined by Prof. Hartt, who at once recognized its primordial character. This conclu- sion was first announced, on the authority of Prof. Hartt, in apaper by Mr. G. F. Matthew, in May 1865 [Geol. Jour., xxi, 426]. The rocks of this region have afforded two species of Paradoxides^ and fourteen of Conocoryphe, together with Agnosias and Mlcro- VoL. VI. V No. 4. 434 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Tol. vi. discvs, all of which have been described by Prof. Hartt. It may here be noticed that in 1862, Prof. Bell found in the black shales of the Dartmouth valley, in Gaspe, a single specimen of a large trilobite, which, according to Mr. Billings, closely resembles Paradoxides Hurlani, but from its imperfectly preserved condi- tion cannot certainly be identified with it. [Geol. Canada, 882]. The geological examinations of Mr. Alexander Murray in Newfoundland since 1865, have shown that the south-eastern part of that island contains a great volume of Cambrian rocks, estimated by him at about 6,000 feet in all. No traces of the Upper Cambrian or second fauna have been detected among these, but some portions contain the Paradoxides already men- tioned, while others yield the fauna which Mr. Billings has called Lower Potsdam. This name was first given in an ap- pendix (prepared by Sir W. E. Logan,) to Mr. Murray's report on Newfoundland for 1865, published in 1866 [page 46 ; see also Report of the Geol. Survey of Canada for 1866, page 236.] The Lower Potsdam was there assigned a place above the Par- adoxides beds of the region, which were called the St. John group, — the fossiliferous strata of St. John, New Brunswick, being referred to the same horizon ; which corresponds to the Menevian of Wales, now recognized as the summit of the Lower Cambrian. The succession of the rocks containing these two faunas in south-eastern Newfoundland is not yet clear ; the Lower Potsdam fauna is regarded by Mr. Billings as identical with that found on the strait of Bellisle, at Bic, (on the south shore of the river St. Lawrence, below Quebec,) at Georgia, Vermont, and at Troy, New York ; but in none of these other localities is it as yet known to be accompanied by a Menevian fauna. The trilobites hitherto described from these rocks belong to the genera Olenellus, Conocoryphe and Agnostus ; neither Paradoxides, which characterizes the Menevian and the under- lying Harlech beds in Wales, nor Olenus, which there abounds ■ in the rocks immediately above this horizon, having as yet been described as occurring in the Lower Potsdam of Mr, Billings. Future discoveries may perhaps assign it a place below instead of above the Menevian horizon. The characteristic Menevian fauna in and near St. John, New Brunswick, is found in a band of about 150 feet, towards the base of a series of nearly vertical sandstones and argillites, underlaid by conglomerates, and resting upon crystalline schists. No. 4.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 435 in a narrow basin. The series, the total thickness of which is estimated by Messrs. Matthew and Bailey at over 2000 feet, contains Lingula throughout, but has yielded no remains of a higrher fauna. The same Menevian forms have been found in small outlying areas of similar rocks, at two or three places north of the St. John basin, but to the south of the New Bruns- wick coal-field. To the north of this is a broad belt of similar argillites and sandstones, which extends south-westward into the state of Maine. This belt has hitherto yielded no organic remains, but is compared by Mr. Matthew to the Cambrian rocks of the St. John basin, and to the gold-bearing series of Nova Scotia, [Geol. Jour, xxi, 427,] which at the same time resembles closely the Cambrian rocks of southeastern Newfound- land. This was remarked by Dr. Dawson in 1860, when he expressed the opinion that the auriferous rocks of Nova Scotia were '^ the continuation of the older slate series of Mr. Jukes in Newfoundland, which has afforded Paradoxides," and proba- bly the equivalent of the Lingula flags of Wales. [Supplement to Acadian Geology (I860,) page 53; also Acad. Geol. 2nd ed., page 613.] Associated with these gold-bearing strata, along the Atlantic coast of Nova Scotia, occur fine grained gneisses, and mica-schists with andalusite and staurolite; besides other crys- talline schists which are chloritic and dioritic, and contain crystal- lized epidote, magnetite and menaccanite. These two types of crystalline schists, (which, from their stratigraphical relations, as well as from their mineral condition, appear to be more ancient than the uncrystalline gold-bearing strata,) were in 1860, as now, regarded by me as the equivalents respectively of the White Mountain and Green Mountain series of the Appalachians ; as will be seen by reference to Dr. Dawson's work just quoted. At that time, however, and for many years after, I held, in com- mon with most American geologists, the opinion that these two groups of crystalline schists were altered rocks of a more recent date than that assigned to the auriferous series of Nova Scotia by Dr. Dawson ; who was much perplexed by the difficulty of reconciling this view with his own. The difficulty is however at once removed when we admit, as I have maintained for the last two years, that both of these groups are pre-Cambrian in age [Amer. Jour. Sci. II, 1. 83 ; address to the Amer. Assoc. Adv' Sci. August, 1871.] A notice by Mr. Selwyn of some of these crystalline schists in 436 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. VI. Nova Scotia will be found in the Report of the Geological Sur- vey of Canada for 1870, [page 271]. He there remarks more- over the close lithological resemblances of the gold-bearing strata to the Harlech grits and Lingula-flags of North Wales, and announces the discovery among these strata at the Ovens gold- mine in Lunenberg, Nova Scotia, of peculiar organic markings regarded by Mr. Billings as identical with the Eopliyton Lin- noeanum, which is found in the Regio Fucoidarum, at the base of the Cambrian in Sweden. In the volume just quoted [page 269] will be found some notes by Mr. Billings on this fossil, which occurs also near St. John, New Brunswick, in strata sup- posed to underlie the Paradoxides beds. The same form is found in Conception Bay, in south-eastern Newfoundland, in strata regarded by Mr. Murray as higher than those ^fi'iih. Paradoxides^ and containing also two new species of Lingula, a Cruziana and several fucoids. Still more recently, Eopliyton, accompanied by these same fucoids, has been found by Mr. Billings at St. Lau- rent, on the island of Orleans near Quebec, in strata hitherto referred by the Geological Survey, on stratigraphical grounds, to the Quebec group. The evidence adduced by Mr. Billings shows that this organic form, whatever its nature, belongs to a very low horizon in the Cambrian. As regards the probable downward extension of these forms of ancient life, I cannot refrain from citing the recent language of Mr, Hicks. [Quar. Jour. Geol. Soc, May 1872, page 174.] After a comparative study of the Lower Cambrian fauna, including that of the Harlech and Menevian rocks in Wales, and the re- presentatives of the latter in other regions, he adds : '' Though animal life was restricted to these few types, yet at this early period the representatives of the several orders do not show a very diminutive form, or a markedly imperfect state ; nor is there an unusual number of blind species. The earliest known brachiopods are apparently as perfect as those which suc- ceed them ; and the trilobites are of the largest and best devel- oped types. The fact also that trilobites had attained their maximum size at this period, and that forms were present repre- sentative of almost every stage in development, from the little Agnostus. with two rings to the thorax, and Microdiscus with four, to Erimiys with twenty-four ; and blind genera along with those having the largest eyes ; leads to the conclusion that for these several stages to have taken place numerous previous faunas No. 4.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 437 must have had an existence, and moreover, that even at this time in the history of our globe, an enormous period had elapsed since life first dawned upon it." The facts insisted upon by Hicks do not appear to be incon- sistent with the view that at this horizon the trilobites had already culminated. Such does not, however, appear to be the idea of Barrande, who in a recent learned essay upon the trilo- bitic fauna [1871] has drawn from its state of development at this early period, conclusions strongly opposed to the theory of derivation. The strata holding the first fauna in south-eastern Newfound- land, rest unconformably, according to Mr. Murray, upon what he has called the Intermediate series ; which is of great thickness, consists chiefly of crystalline rocks, and is supposed by him to represent the Huronian. He has however included in this inter- mediate series several thousand feet of sandstones and argillites which, near St. Johns in Newfoundland, are seen to be uncon- formably overlaid by the fossiliferous strata already noticed, and have yielded two species of organic forms, lately described by Mr. Billings. One of these is an Arenicolites, like the A. spiralis found in the Lower Cambrian beds of Sweden, and the other a patella-like shell, to which he has given the name of Aspidella Terranovica. [Amer. Jour. Science, III, iii, 223.] These, from their stratigraphical position, have been regarded as Huronian ; but from the lithological description of Mr. Murray, the strata containing them appear to be unlike the great mass of the Huronian rocks of the region. Their occurrence in these strata, in either case, marks a downward extension of these forms of paleozoic life. Mr. Billings has described from the rocks of the first fauna certain forms under the name of Archeoci/athus, one of the species of which, according to Dr. Dawson, belonged to a cal- careous chambered foraminiferal organism similar in its nature to much of the Stromatopora of the second, and closely related Coenostroma of the third fauna. All of these Dawson shows to have strong affinities to Eozoon, which is represented by E. Canadense of the Laurentian, and by similar forms in the newer crystalline schists of Hastings, Ontario, as well as by the E. Bavaricum of the upper crystalline schists of Bavaria. The succession of related foraminiferal organisms, is farther seen in the Devonian limestones of Michigan, where occur great masses 438 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. like Stromatopora, which present, according to Dawson a struc- ture intermediate between the Eozoon of the Laurentian and the genera Parkeria and Loftusia of the Cretaceous and the Eocene. The details are taken from Dr. Dawson's recent prCvsidential address to the Natural History Society of Montreal, in May, 1872, where he has announced some of the results of his studies, yet in progress, on the earlier foraminifera. In 1856 the late Prof. Emmons described [Amer. Jour. Sci. II, xxii, 389] under the name of Palaeotrochis, certain forms regarded by him as organic, found in North Carolina in a bed of auriferous quartzite, among rocks referred to his Taconic system. Their organic nature has also been maintained by Prof. Wurtz, but from my own examinations, I agree with the opinion expressed by Prof. Hall, and subsequently supported by the observations of Prof. Marsh, [Ibid. II, xxiii, 278 ; xvl. 217] that the forms to which the name of Palaeotrochis has been given are nothing more than silicious concretions. As regards the geological horizon of the series of strata to which Sir William Logan has given the name of the Quebec group, the Sillery and Lauzon divisions have as yet yielded to the paleontologist only two species of Oholella and one of Lingula, Our comparisons must therefore be based upon the fauna of the Levis limestones and graptolitic shales, which have already been compared with the Middle Cambrian or Fes- tiniog group of Sedgwick, by the combined labors of Billings and Salter. The former has moreover carefully compared this fauna with that of the lower members of the New York system ; in which the succession of organic life appears to have been very much interrupted. Thus, according to Mr. Billings, of the ninety species known to exist in the Chazy limestone of the Ottawa basin, only twenty-two species have been observed to pass up into the directly -overlying Birdseye and Black-River lime- stones. The break between the Chazy and the underlying Cal- ciferous sandrock, in this region, is still more complete ; since, according to the same authority, of forty-four species in the latter only two pass up into the Chazy limestone. This latter break in the succession appears to be filled, in the region to the eastward of the Ottawa basin, by the Levis limestone ; which has been studied near Quebec, and also near Phillipsburg, not far from the outlet of Lake Champlain. This formation (including the accompanying graptolitic shales,) has yielded, up to the present No. 4.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 439 time, 219 species of organic remains, (comprising seventy-four of Crustacea, and fifty one of graptolitidige) none of which, accord- ins; to Mr. BilUmjrs, have been found either in the Potsdam or in the Birdseye and Black River limestone. Twelve of the species of the Levis formation are however met with in the Calciferous, and five in the Chazy of the Ottawa basin, and the Levis is therefore regarded by Mr. Billings as the connecting link between these two formations. With regard to the British equivalents of these rocks, the Levis limestone, according to Salter, corresponds to the Tremadoc beds ; although the species of DlkeUocephalus found in the Levis rocks are by him compared with those found in the Upper Lin- gula flags or Dolgelly beds. The graptolitic strata of Levis however clearly represent the Lower Llandeilo or Arenig rocks of North Wales, the Skiddaw group of Sedgwick in Cumberland, the graptolitic beds which in Esthonia, according to Schmidt, are found below the orthoceratite-limestones, [Can. Naturalist, I. vi. 345] and those of Victoria in Australia, [Mem. Geol. Sur. Ill, part 2, 255, 304.] In the Lower Llandeilo and Upper Trema- doc beds there appears to be in North Wales, a mingling of forms of the first and second faunas, as in the Levis and Chazy formations. The latter was already, by Hall, in 1847, declared to be beneath the Silurian horizon then recognized in Great Britain. By its fauna it is comparatively isolated from the strata both below and above it, and stratigraphically as well as paleontologically it would appear to belong rather than to the lower than to the higher rocks. According to a private communication from Prof. James Hall, the Chazy limestone at Middleville, Herkimer county. New York, to the south of the Adirondacks, is wanting, and the basal beds of the Trenton group (the Birdseye limestone) there rest unconformably upon the Calciferous sandrock. The relations of the various members of the Quebec group to each other, and of the group, as a whole, to the succeeding Tren- ton and Hudson-River groups, require further elucidation. If, as I am disposed to believe, the southeastward-dipping series of the older strata near Quebec, exhibits the northwest side of an overturned and eroded anticlinal, in which the normal order of the strata is inverted, then the Lauzon and Sillery divisions, which there appear to overlie the Levis limestones and shales, are older rocks, occupying the position of the Potsdam or still 440 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. lower members of the Cambrian. Sir William Logan supposes the appearance of these rocks in their present attitude by the side of the strata of the Trenton and Hudson River-groups, in the vicinity of Quebec, to be due to a great dislocation and uplift, subsequent to the deposition of these higher rocks ; but, as sug- gested in my address of last year, I conceive the Quebec group to have been in its present upturned and disturbed condition before the deposition of the Trenton limestones. The supposed dislocation and uplift, extending from the gulf of St. Lawrence to Virginia, is according to this view, but the outcrop of the rocks of the first fauna from beneath the unconformably over- lying strata of the second fauna. The later movements along the borders of the Appalachian region have however, to some extent, affected these, in their turn, and thus complicated the relations of the two series. This unconformity, which corresponds to the marked bre;ik between the Levis and Trenton faunas, is farther shown by the stratigraphical break and discordance in Herkimer county, Mew York ; and by the fact that beyond the limits of the Ottawa basin, on either side, the limestone of the Trenton group rests directly on the crystalline rocks ; the older members of the New York system being altogether absent at the northern outcrop, as well as in the outliers of Trenton limestone seen to the north oF Lake Ontario, and as far to the north-cast as Lake St. John on the Saguenay. This distribution shows that a considerable movement, just previous to the Trenton period, took place both to the west and the east of the Adirondack region, which formed the southern boundary of the Ottawa basin. The Levis and Chazy formations, as we have seen, offer a commingling of forms of the first and second faunas, which shows them to belong to a period of transition between the two ; but it is remarkable that so far as yet observed, no representatives of the later of these faunas are known to the east and south of the Appalachians, along the Atlantic coast; the first fauna, whether in Massachusetts, New Brunswick or southeastern Newfound- land, being unaccompanied by any forms of the second. The third fauna, on the contrary, is represented in various localities both within and to the east of the Appalachian region, from Massachusetts to Newfoundland. In parts of Gaspe, and also in Nova Scotia, strata holding forms referred to the Clinton and Niagara divisions are met with, as well as other beds of Lower Helderberg age, associated with species of shells and of plants No. 4.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 441 which connect this fauna with that of the succeeding Lower Devonian or Erian period. To this Lower Helderberg horizon (corresponding to the Ludlow of England) appear to belong certain fossiliferous beds found along the Atlantic coast of Maine and of New Brunswick, in Nova Scotia and (?) in Newfound- land ; as well as others included in the Appalachian belt in Massachusetts, New Harapshire, Vermont and Quebec, along the Connecticut valley and its north-eastern prolongation. The fos- siliferous strata just noticed, both in the Connecticut valley, and along the Atlantic coast, occur in small areas among the older crystalline schists, often made up of the ruins of these, and in highly inclined attitudes. The same is true in some places of the similarly situated strata of Cambrian, Devonian and Lower Carboniferous periods. These derived strata, of different ages, have, from their lithological resemblances to the parent rocks, been looked upon as examples of a subsequent alteration of paleozoic sediments; and by a farther extension of this notion, the pre-Cambrian crystalline schists themselves throughout this region have been looked upon as the result of an epigenic change of these various paleozoic strata ; portions of which, here and there, were supposed to have escaped conversion, and to have retained more or less perfectly their sedimentary character, and their organic remains, elsewhere obliterated. From the absence of the second fauna we may conclude that the great Appalachian area was, at least in New England and Canada, above the ocean during its period, and suffered a partial and gradual submergence in the time of the third fauna. This movement corresponds to the well-marked paleontological and stratigraphical break between the second and third faunas in the great continental basin to the westward, made evident by the appearance of the Oneida or Shawangunk conglomerate (appar- ently derived from the ruins of Lower Cambrian rocks) which, in some parts, overlies the strata of the Hudson-River group. The break is elsewhere shown by the absence of this conglo- merate, and of the succeeding formations up to the Lower Helderberg division. This latter, in various localities in the valleys of the Hudson and the St, Lawrence, rests unconformably upon the strata of the second fauna, as it does upon the older crystalline rocks to the eastward. In Ohio, according to Newberry, the base of the rocks of the third fauna (Clinton and Medina) is represented by a conglo- 442 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. merate which holds in its pebbles the organic remains of the underlyiog strata of the second fauna. To the north-eastward, the island of Anticosti in the gulf of St. Lawrence, presents a succession of about 1400 feet of calcar- eous strata rich in organic remains, which, according to Mr. Billings, include the species of the Medina, Clinton and Niagara formations, and were named by him, in 1857, the Anticosti group. They rest upon nearly 1000 feet of almost horizontal strata, consisting of limestones and shales rich in organic remains, with many included beds of limestone-conglomerate. This series has by the Geological Survey of Canada been referred to the Hudson-River group, but notwithstanding the large number of forms of the second fauna which it contains. Prof. Shaler is dis- posed to look upon it as younger, and belonging rather to the succeeding division. There seems not to have been any marked paleontological break between the second and third faunas in this region ; and it is worthy of note, in this connection, that in the outlying basin of paleozoic rocks, found at Lake St. John, to the north of Anticosti, Halysites catenulatus is met with in limestones associated with many species of organic remains char- acteristic of the Trenton and referred to that group. [Geology of Canada, page 165.] The strata to which, in 1857, Mr. Billings gave the name of the Anticosti group were at the same time designated by him Middle Silurian, in which he subsequently included the local sub-division known as the Guelph formation, which in westera Ontario succeeds the Niagara; the name of Upper Silurian being thus reserved for the Lower Helderberg division and the underlying Onondaga formation [Report Geol. Sur, Can. 1857, page 248, and Geol. Can. page 20.] Both the Guelph and the Onondaga have been omitted from the table on page 312; the Guelph because it was not recognized in the New York system, and is by some regarded as but a sub-division of the Niagara ; and the Onondaga, for the reason that it is a local deposit of magnesian limestones, wiih gypsums and rock-salt, destitute of organic remains. As to the name of Middle Silurian, it had some years pre- viously been used by the officers of the government Geological Survey in Great Britain to designate the Lower and Upper Llandovery rocks; but is referred to in 1854 by Sedgwick as one that had, at that time, already been abandoned, (L. E. & D. No. 4.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 443 Philos. Mag. Ill, viii, 303, 367, 501,) and is also rejected by Lyell, (Student's Manual of Geology, page 452.) It is not used by Murehison, cither in his Silurian System or in the various editions of SiJuri^i, or by Ramsay, who however speaks of the Llandovery rocks as an intermediate series, (Mem. Geol. Survey III, part 2, page 2.) Inasmuch as the name of Silurian was erroneously applied to the rocks of the second fauna, and pro- perly belongs to those of the third fuma only, that of Middle Silurian should b crejected from our nomenclature in North America, as has already been done in England. The strata to which it has been applied, on both sides of the Atlantic, are how- ever important as illustrations of the passage from one fauna to another. The history of the introduction of the names of Silurian and Devonian into North American geology demands our notice. Prof. Hall, as we have seen, while recognizins: in the rocks of the New York system the representatives alike of the British Cambrian, Silurian and Devonian, wisely refrained from adopt- ing this nomenclature, drawn from a reirion where wide diversities of opinion and controversies existed as to the value and signifi- cance of these divisions. Lyell however in the account of his first journey to the United States, published in 1845, applied the terms Lower and Upper Silurian and Devonian to our paleozoic rocks. Later, in 1846, de Verneuil, the friend and the colleague of Murehison in his Russian researches, visited the United States, and on his return to France published, in 1847, (Bui. Soc. Geol. de Fr. II, iv, 12, 646) an elaborate comparison between the European paleozoic deposits and those of North America, as made known by Hall and others. He proposed to group the whole of the rocks of the New York system, up to the summit of the Hudson-River group, in the Lower Silurian, and the suc- ceedmg members, including the Lower Helderberg, and the overlying Oriskany, in the Upper Silurian ; the remaining form- ations to the base of the Carboniferous system being called Devonian. This essay by de Verneuil was translated and abridged by Prof. Hall, and published by him in the American Journal of Science (II. v. 176, 359; vii. 45, 218,) with critical remarks, wherein he objected to the application of this disputed nomenclature to North American geology. Meanwhile the Geological Survey of Canada was in progress under Logan, who in his preliminary report in 1842, and in his 444 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. subsequent ones for 1844 and 1846, adopted the nomenclature of the New York system, without reference to European divi- sions. Subsequently however, the usage of Lyell and de Verneuil was adopted by Logan, who in his report for 1848 (page 57) spoke of the Clinton group as the base of the "■ Upper Silurian series," while in that for 1850 (page 34) he declared the whole of a great series of fossiliferous rocks in Eastern Canada, includ- ing the Trenton, TJtica and Hudson-River divisions, and the shales and sandstones of Quebec, (then supposed to be superior to these,) to "belong to the Lower Silurian." In the report for 1852 (page 64) the Lower Silurian was made by Mr. Murray to include not only the Utica and Trenton, but the Chazy limestone, the Calciferous sandrock and the Potsdam sandstone of the New York system. From this time the Silurian nomenclature, as applied by Lyell and de Verneuil to our North American rocks, was employed by the officers of the Canadian Geological Survey (myself among the others,) and was subsequently adopted by Prof. Dana in his Manual of Geology, published in 1863. The Geological Survey of Pennsylvania, under the direction of Prof. Henry Darwin Rogers, was begun, like that of New York, in 1836, and the paleozoic rocks of the state were at first divided, on stratigraphical and lithological grounds, into groups, which were designated, in ascending order, by Roman numerals. Subsequently, as he informs us in the preface to his final Report on the Geology of Pennsylvania, Prof. H. D. Rogers, in concert with his brother. Prof William B. Rogers, then directing the Geological Survey of Virginia, considered the question of geolo- gical nomenclature. Rejecting, after mature deliberation, the classification and nomenclature both of the British and New York Geological Surveys they proposed a new one for the whole paleozoic column to the top of the coal-measures, founded on the conception of a great paleozoic day, the divisions of which were designated by names taken from the sun's apparent course through the heavens. (Geology of Penn. I. vi, 105.) So far as regards the three great groups which we have recognized in the lower paleozoic rocks, the later names of Rogers, and his earlier numerical designations, with their equivalents in the New York system, were as follows : Primal, (I.) This includes the mass of 2500 feet or more of shales and sandstones, which in Pennsylvania and Virginia, and farther southward, form the base of the paleozoic series, and rest No. 4.] HUNT — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 445 upon crystalline schists. The Primal division was regarded by the Messrs, Rogers as the equivalent both of the Potsdam and the still lower members of the Cambrian. Auroral, (11.) This division, which, with the last, includes the first fauna, consists in great part of magnesian limestones, and corresponds to the Calciferous and Chazy formations. Its thickness in Pennsylvania varies from 2500 to 5000 feet, and with the preceeding division, it includes the first fauna. The representatives of the Primal and Auroral divisions attain a great development in eastern Tennessee, where they have been studied by Safi"ord. Matinal, (III.) In this, which represents the second fauna, were comprised the limestones of the Trenton group, together with the Utica and Hudson-River shales. Levant, (lY .) This division corresponds to the Oneida and Medina conglomerates and sandstones. Siirgent, Scalent and Pre- Meridional (V. VI.) In these divisions were included the representatives of the Clinton,. Niagara and Lower Helderberg groups of New York, making, with division IV., the third fauna. The parallelism of these divisions with the British rocks was most clearly and correctly pointed out by H. D. Rogers himself, in an explanation prepared, as I am informed, with the collabora- tion of Prof. William B. Rogers, and published in 1856, with a geological map of North America by the former, in the second edition of Keith Johnson's Physical Atlas. The paleozoic rocks of North America are there divided into several groups, of which the first, including the Primal, Auroral and Matinal, is declared to be the near representative of " the European paleozoic deposits from the first-formed fossiliferous beds to the close of the Bala group ; that is to say the proximate representatives of the Cam- brian of Sedgwick.'.' A second group embraces the Levant, Surgent, Scalent and Pre-Meridional. These are said to be *' the very near representatives of the true European Silurian, regarding this series as commencing with the May-Hill sand- stone." The Levant division is farther declared to be the equi- valent of the sandstone just named ; while the Matinal is made to correspond to the Llandeilo, Bala or Upper Cambrian ; the Auroral with the Festiniog or Middle Cambrian ; and the Primal with the Lingula flags, the Obolus sandstone of Russia and the Pri- mordial of Bohemia. 446 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. The reader of the List few pages of this history will have seen how tlie Silurian nomenclature of Murchison and the British Geological Survey has been, through Lyell. de Verneuil and the Canadian Survey, introduced into American geology in opposi- tion to the judgment, and against the protests of James Hall and the Messrs. Kogers, the founders of American paleozoic geology. Three points have I think, been made clear in the first and second parts of this sketch : First, that the series, to which the name of Cambrian was applied by Sedgwick in 1835, (limited by him as to its downward extension, in 1838) was co-extensive with the rocks characterized by the first and second faunas. Second, that the series to which the name of Silurian was given by Murchison in 1835, included the second and third faunas; but that the rocks of the second fauna, the Upper Cambrian of Sedgwick, were only included in the Silurian system of Murchison by a series of errors and misconceptions in stratigraphy, on the part of the latter, which gave him no right to claim the rocks of the second fauna as a lower member of his Silurian. Third, that there was no ground whatever for subsequently annexing to the Silurian of Murchison, the Lower and Middle Cambrian divi- sions of Sedgwick, which the latter had separated from the Upper Cambrian on stratigraphical grounds, and which were subse- quently found to contain a distinct and more ancient fauna. The name of Silurian should therefore be restricted, as main- tained by Sedgwick and by the Messrs. Rogers, to the rocks of the third fauna, the so-called Upper Silurian of Murchison ; and the names of Middle Silurian, Lower Silurian, and Primordial - Silurian banished from our nomenclature. The Cambrian of Sedgwick however includes the rocks both of the first aod second faunas. To the former of these, the lower and middle divisions of the Cambrian, (the Bangor and Festiniog groups of Sedgwick,) Phillips, Lyell, Davidson, Harkness, Hicks and other British geologists, agree in applying the name of Cambrian. The great Bala group of Sedgwick, which constitutes his Upper Cambrian, is however as distinct from the last as it is from the overlying Silurian, and deserves a not less distinctive name than these two. Its original designation of Upper Cambrian, given when the zoological importance of Lower and Middle Cambrian was as yet unknown, is not sufiiciently characteristic, and the same is to be said of the name of Lower Silurian, wrongly imposed No. 4.J HUNO' — ON CAMBRIAN AND SILURIAN. 447 upon it. The importance of this great Bala group in Britain, and of its North American equivalent, the Matinal of Rogers, — including the whole of the limestones of the Trenton group, with the succeeding Utica and Hudson-River shales, — might justify the invention of a new and special name. That of Cambro- Silurian, at one time proposed by Sedgwick himself, and adopted by Phillips and by Jukes, was subsequently withdrawn by him, when investigations made it clear that this group had been wrongly united with the Silurian by Murchison. Deference to Sedgwick should therefore prevent us from restoring this name, which moreover, from its composition, connects the group rather with the Silurian than the Cambrian. Neither of these objec- tions can be urged against the similarly constructed term of Siluro-Cambrian, which moreover has the advantage that no other new name could possess, of connecting the group both with the true Silurian, to which it has very generally been united, and with the Cambrian, of which, from the first, it has formed a part. I therefore venture to suggest the name of Siluro-Cam- brian, as a convenient synonym for the Upper Cambrian of Sedgwick, (the Lower Silurian of Murchison,) corresponding to the second fauna ; reserving at the same time the name of Cam- brian for the rocks of the first fauna, — the Lower and Middle Cambrian of Sedgwick, — and restricting with him the name of Silurian to the rocks of the third fauna, — the Upper Silurian of Murchison.* The late Prof Jukes, it may here be mentioned, in his Manual of Geology, published in 1857, still retained for the Bala group the name of Cambro-Silurian (which had been withdrawn by Sedgwick in 1^54) and reserved the name of the " true Siluriau period " for the Upper Silurian of Murchison. In his recent * Dr. Dawson, in his address as president of the Natural History Society of Montreal, in May 1872, has taken the occasion of the publication in the Canadian Naturalist^ of the tirst and second parts of this sketch, to review the subject here discussed. Recognizing the necessity of a reform in the nomenclature of the paleozoic rocks, in conformity with tlie views of Sedgwick, he would restrict to the rocks of the third fauna the name of Silurian, making it a division equivalent to Devonian; and while reserving with Lyell, Phillips and others, the name of Cambrian for the first fauna only, agrees with me in the propriety of adopting the name of Siluro-Cambrian for the second fauna. 448 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vl. and much improved edition of this excellent Manual (1872), Prof. Giekie, the director of the Geological Survey of Scotland? has substituted the nomenclature of Murchison ; with the impor- tant exception, however, that he follows Hicks and Salter in separating the Menevian from the Lingula-flags, and uniting it with the underlying Harlech rocks (as has been done in the table on page 312), giving to the two the name of Cambrian [loc. cit., pages 526-529], and thus, on good paleontological grounds, ex- tending this name above the horizon admitted by Murchison. Barrande, on the contrary, in his recent essay on trilobites (1871, page 250), makes the Silurian to include not only the Lingula- flags proper (Maentwrog and Dolgelly), but the Menevian, and even a great part of the Harlech rocks themselves (the Cambrian of Murchison and the Geological Survey), for the reason that the primordial fauna has now been shown by Hicks to extend towards their base. This, although consistent with Barrande's previous views as to the extension of the name Silurian, is a still greater violation of historic truth. By thus making the Silurian system of Murchison to include successively the Upper Cambrian and the Middle Cambrian of Sedgwick, and finally his Lower Cam- brian, (the Cambrian system of Murchison himself,) we seem to have arrived at a rediictlo ad ahsurdum of the Silurian nomen- clature ; and we may apply to Siluria, as Sedgwick has already done, the apt quotation once used by Conybeare, with reference to the Graywacke of the older geologists, which it replaces ; '' est Jupiter quodcunque vides.'^ It would be unjust to conclude this historical sketch of the names Cambrian and Silurian in Geology, without a passing tribute to the venerable Sedgwick, who to-day, at the age of eighty-seven years, still retains unimpaired his great powers of mind, and his interest in the progress of geological science. The labors of his successors in the study of British geology, up to the present time, have only served to confirm the exactitude of his early stratigraphical determinations ; and the last results of in- vestigations on both continents unite in showing that in the Cambrian series, as defined by him more than a generation since, he laid, on a sure foundation, the bases of paleozoic geology. No. 4.] NICHOLSON — SEXUAL SELECTION IN MAN. 449 SEXUAL SELECTION IN MAN. By H. Alleyne Nicholson, M.D., D.Sc, F.R.S.E., Professor of Natural History and Botany in University College, Toronto. " Sexual selection " is the term employed by Darwin to denote a twofold winnowing, to which he believes that the individuals of many species of animals are subjected. On the one hand, certain males being stronger and more powerful than the others, succeed in leaving descendants behind them, whilst other weaker males do not get the opportunity of perpetuating their peculiarities, the female in this case remaining passive. On the other hand, it is believed that in some cases the females have the power of choos- ing their mates, and that they select such males as please them best, whether this be in consequence of some peculiarity of form, colour, or voice, or as a result of some undefinable attraction. In this process the selection lies with the female, and the male re. mains passive, in any other sense than that he does what he can to secure that the choice of the female shall fall upon him in- stead of upon any other of his rivals. In either case I\Ir. Darwin believes that great modifications have been produced in this way, and that many animals owe to this cause some of their most striking peculiarities. Mr. Darwin, in fact, has so far abandoned his former belief in the efiicacy of '' natural selection " as an agent in producing the diflferences which separate different species of animals, as to admit that some supplementary cause must, in some cases at any rate, be looked for ; and this he thinks is to be found in the action, through long periods, of " sexual selec- tion." Without entering into the question of the extent to which Mr. Darwin's views may be depended on as regards animals, we purpose here very briefly to survey his application of the theory of sexual selection to the case of man. In so doing we shall glance at the leading propositions laid down in Chapters XIX and XX of the "Descent of Man,"' examining in greater detail those which ap- pear to be of the highest importance. It may as well be pre- mised, however, that there are two distinct aspects to the question of sexual selection, in the case of all animals alike, but especially in the case of man. It is one thing to admit the existence of Vol. VI. V No. 4. 450 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST; [Vol. VI. what Mr. Darwin calls " sexual selection," as an actual fact ; and in the case of man it is undeniable that such a kind of selection must have existed, whilst it is almost certain that it must have played some important part in the development of the species. It is one thing to admit this; but it is quite another thing to admit that any of the peculiarities which separate man from the brutes are due to this cause. Few will be disposed to deny the existence of selection, both natural and sexual, amongst mankind, but many will be disposed to doubt if any adequate ground has as yet been advanced for the belief that man's distinctive charac- ters have been acquired in consequence of the action of either of these causes. In the case of sexual selection, with which alone we are dealing at present, Mr. Darwin himself admits the weak- ness of his case, as regards man ; and does not hesitate to candidly confess that his views on this subject " want scientific precision." We shall endeavour to show, not only that this is the case, but that some important elements in settling this question have been altogether overlooked ; whilst we must fully recognize the ability with which Mr. Darwin supports his views, and the vast research which characterises all his observations on this and kindred topics. Mr. Darwin begins by pointing out the chief physical differ- ences which distinguish the man from the woman; and he indi- cates that " as with animals of all classes, so with man, the dis- tinctive characters of the male sex are not fully developed until he is nearly mature; and if emasculated they never appear." It follows from this — as, indeed e^'ery one will admit — that some of the characters of the male, as his possession of a beard and his bass voice, are characters clearly connected with his relations with the other sex ; so that if these relations be disturbed or abolished, they do not appear. A still more striking fact, point- ing in the same direction, and showing how certain apparently trivial characters are in both sexes connected with the function of reproduction, is the not uncommon growth of hair to a greater or less extent upon the face of women in whom the reproductive functions have naturally ceased to be active. A curious consideration, however, arises here. If we take the case of a male who has been emasculated in early life, we find that, more or less perfectly, he retains throughout life some of the characters of his boyhood, which are also common to the female, such as smoothness of skin, a beardless face, and a treble voice. Are we^ however, on this account to conclude that we No. 4.] NICHOLSON^SEXtJAL SELECTION IN MAN. 451 are dealing with anything but a male ? There are the strongest grounds for the belief that the characters which distinguish the two sexes lie far deeper than the mere physical structure. The difiference between the male and female, in man at any rate, seems to be a fundamental one, in which the entire nature is involved ; and the male, when artificially mutilated, no more ceases to be a male, than a man ceases to be a man when his leg- has been amputated. It is true that the mutilation has rendered him imperfect in one very important aspect of his nature ; but the difierence is bodily, not mental, and he cannot do otherwise than remain a male as regards his essential nature. It is quite true, also, that as in the case of emasculated animals, the bodily incapacity is accompanied by a deficiency in certain mental at- tributes which minister to the corporeal function. Thus, the mutilated might very possibly be less courageous or pugnacious than the normal man. Still, we cannot believe that the deeper differences which fundamentally separate the man from the woman, are in any way affected by such a mutilation. We should, at any rate, require much more evidence than we hold at present before concluding that such mutilated males are not distinguished by just those mental characters (with the exception of the above) which are afterwards enumerated by Darwin as distinguishing the male from the female in the human species. Having discussed the physical differences between the male and female, Mr. Darwin, under the head of " Law of Battle," next endeavours to show that man, in his earlier stages at any rate, must have had to fight for his wife, and that success in marriage must have been to the strongest, in most, if not in all cases. No doubt if this could be shown, there would be a reason- able probability that the race might have been much improved in this way, the strongest and most powerful males leaving the largest number of children, and these inheriting the physical characters to which the success of their fathers was due. We cannot think, however, that Mr. Darwin sufficiently recognizes to what an extent even the lowest savage is something more than a mere animal, and how largely the spiritual element enters into bis composition. Taking the savage races known to us — and we have no right to speak dogmatically as to the supposed habits of a hypothetical and still more degraded race — Professor Huxley has recently admitted that the intellectual labour of a good hun- ter or warrior '• considerably exceeds that of an ordinary English- 452 'jHte CANADIAN NATtJRALiST. [Vol. vi. man." A much smaller admission would answer our purpose, as all that is here contended for is that the struggle for any coveted object, amongst even the lowest savage races known to us, is in the main a spiritual contest and not a physical one. Even if we suppose the struggle to be decided by purely physical arguments, still success would by no means invariably attend the strongest, but would be more likely, in the long run, to fall to the cleverest. In the case of a contest between two male animals, such as two stags, we may believe that the strongest is sure to win ; but this would by no means hold good amongst even the lowest savages. No races of men are known to us so degraded as to fight solely with the weapons nature has given. But the moment artificial weapons are employed, the contest becomes essentially one of skill and not of mere streno'th. In other words, the result of the contest -would depend mainly upon the mental characters of the combatants, instead of on their relative physical strength. Take the only case Mr. Darwin adduces in support of his view, namely the case of the North American Indians, of whom Hearne says that the men w^restle for any woman to whom they are attached, and that "of course, the strongest party always carries ofi" the prize." Any one, however, who has ever seen wrestling knows that this last statement does not express a fact. Success in wrestling depends only to a very limited extent upon actual strength or even weight, but almost entirely upon skill. Not only is this the case, but success in wrestling is largely influenced by the possession of certain mental peculiarities, wholly irrespec- tive of mere mechanical adroitness. Upon the whole, then, it is perhaps safe to conclude that even the actual physical contests between individual men or tribes of Mien, however savage, are ultimately decided by the mental ich^racters of the competitors, as much as by an34hing else. We may^ i^owever, go further than this. Admitting that women are always lifeeJv amongst savage races to constitute a bone of con- tention for ike men to fight over, still we need not admit that success iu suicb :^ fight would always, or even generally, fall to the strongest^ On th&- contrary, the man most skilful in the use of his weapon, most fertif-G m resource, with the most inventive genius, and with the most rcr^dy use of his tongue, would be at least as likely to win a Kxii'e as th*e biggest and strongest of his ■icompetitors. Mere brute strength is not always the ultima ratio .-.J^ 1? 4^4