Page:Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London, vol. 28.djvu/200

 166 PPvOCEEDIKGS OP THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. character of its flora. Among the ferns, the Pecopterids are wanting or very rare, as they are in all the Lower Carboniferons of Europe ; the different forms of Cyclopterids and of the fine-leaved Sphenopterids, on the contrary, are very frequent and characterize the fern-flora of this period. In the Coal-measures, on the contrary, the genera Neuro- ^teris and Pecopieris (including Cyatlieites and Aletlio])teris) are deve- loped in a variety of species, and appear everywhere in great abund- ance. Lepidodendron extends through the Lower and Middle Car- boniferous, but on the whole is more abundant in the former, while the Sigillarice, which play so important a part in the Coal-measures, are almost entirely wanting in the Lower Carboniferous. In fact, the whole flora of the Lower Carboniferous period must have had a different aspect from that of the Coal-measures, although it con- sisted of the same families and, in a great measure, of the same genera. If we now glance once more over the Lower Carboniferous strata of Bear Island, we cannot fail to recognize a striking resemblance between them and the formations of the same age in Europe, espe- cially in the south of Ireland. We may classify them in the follow- ing manner. p o a Q ID o 1-q Bear Island. South Ireland. Other localities. III. Mill- stone-grit stage. Siliceous schists. Posidonomya- shales and coal. Culmiferous in Devon ; Millstone-grits, Upper Greywacke and Posi- donomya-iiii^leii in the Harz, Silesia, and Mo- ravia. II. Moun- tain-Lime- stone stage. Productus- and Spirifer- limestone. Limestone formation with Producttts and Spirifer. Burdie House ; Momitain Limestone and shales in Silesia; Hainichen, Ebersdorf, Artinsk, Pe- trowskaja,&c.in Russia ; Parry Island, Spitzber- gen. I. Ursa stage. Cyatho'p'hyllum- limestone. Carboniferous shale with Cyathophyllum. Barnstaple. Sandstones and shales with plants. Yellow Sandstone with plants. Greywacke of the Yosges and the southern Black Forest ; Marwood plant- bed (?), St. John's, in Canada ; Sandstone of Melville Island, Cats- kill and Chemung ? Doubt- ful. Devo- nian. Russian-Island Limestone. Upper Old Red. Red shales. Old Red. Gypris-shtAeB of Saalfeld. The Coal-measures are wanting in Bear Island, as in Spitzbergen;