128 [June, 



When I first saw them, I was not aware that Ceratites had ever been found in 

 any other but in the Triassic formation, and the discovery astonished me in a 

 high degree. I was indeed induced to believe that they indicated the presence 

 of the Trias somewhere not very far from the place where they were found, until 

 I saw that L. V. Buch found Ceratites in the cretaceous rocks. 



It is true the specimeos alluded to were found on a sand-bank in the Black 

 Warrior River, where it cuts through the lowest part of the cretaceous formation 

 of our southern States, just below a very deep place of the river ; but are they 

 not marked out of a formation underlying the upper secondary and reactied by 

 the water of the river in that deep place ? If these Ceratites were a fossil belong- 

 ing to the cretaceous formation, even to the very lowest part of it, specimens of 

 them must and would have been found before and after my finding them. There 

 are a great many places in Alabama, as well as in Mississippi and Tennessee, 

 where the lower part of the cretaceous rocks crops out, where it is cut through 

 by rivers and gullies, and where it has often and carefully been examined and 

 searched for fossils, but never, neither before nor afterwards, have specimens of 

 Ceratites been found. 



I have myself carefully examined a good many such outcrops in Alabama, 

 even the one where the Ceratites were found ; as State Geologist of Mississippi, 

 and for more than two years engaged in the geological survey of this State, 1 

 have examined very nearly all the outcrops of the lower cretaceous formation, 

 which is here still better developed than in Alabama ; I have made it a particular 

 point to search carefully for Ceratites, but never again have I succeeded to find 

 another specimen of the Ceratites; nor have I ever heard that any one of the 

 many amateurs that collect fossils has ever seen or found one. 



That the above described specimens of Ceratites have been washed out of a 

 formation underlying the cretaceous rocks in Alabama, seems to me the more 

 probable, first, as there is in that State between the carboniferous and creta- 

 ceous formation an area occupied by an intermediate, undetermined formation, 

 extending from Autuga County through parts of Bibb, Tuscaloosa and Pi> kens 

 to Fayette County, which has been laid down in the geological chart of thai 

 State of 1849 (by a typographical error, as I understand,) as iertiari/. hat -which, 

 although in many places covered by drifted tertiary sands and clay, is by no 

 means tertiary. It goes under the lower cretaceous rocks and is overlapped by 

 them, is clearly visible, not only in the northern part of the town of Eutaw, but 

 also at Finch's Ferry, on the Black Warrior, in Greene County. What forma- 

 tion this is seems difiicult to decide, it being devoid of fossils. It must, of course, 

 be one of the older formations, intermediate between the coal and the lime, and 

 I should not at all be astonished if a careful examination should give the resul: 

 of its classification among the Poikilitic rocks, to which its variegated clay bears 

 indeed great resemblance. Another reason which renders it more probable that 

 the Ceratites have been worked out of a formation wnderlying the cretaceous 

 formation, is that nearly all the Artesian wells in Greene County, in Alabama, 

 contain a great deal of chloride of sodium and give really salt water. It is not 

 very probable that this chloride of sodium, very seldom, if ever, comes from the 

 salt-bearing cretaceous formation. 



Examination of the Meteoric Iron from Jiiquipilco, Mexico^ 

 By W. J. Taylor. 



The meteoric iron from Xiquipilco, Mexico, appears to have been first men- 

 tioned in the Gazeta de Mexico in 1'784. It is stated there that small pieces of 

 native iron, from a few ounces to fifty pounds in weight, were very numerous, 

 which were sought for by the Indians after heavy rains, who used them for 

 manufacturing agricultural implements. 



In a dissertation on metallic meteorites by Prof. W. S. Clark, the following 

 notices of its literature are given : Ann. des Mines t. 2, ser. 1, p. 337. Gazeta 

 de Mexico 178485, vol. i., pp. 146, 200. Klaproth Beitrage zur chemischen 



