18^3.] Transition Formation of Sweden, 23 



line, and Contains only echinosphaerites pomum. The next is 

 grey ; it contains large entomostracites and few orthoceratites ; 

 the uppermost is mostly red, and contains a great number of large 

 orthoceratites. Upon the limestone follows a bed of clayslate, 

 122 feet thick, of which the lowermost part is like the bitu- 

 minous slate of the bed below the limestone; so that it is fre- 

 quently necessary to distinguish them by their fossils, of which 

 a small kind of orthoceratites is peculiar to the bituminous slate 

 above the hmestone. Next follows a cliertlike liver-coloured 

 kind of stone which now and then forms beds of the thickness 

 of a foot, and contains echinosphaerites aurantium ; uppermost 

 lies a whitish stone resembling sandstone. Upon these beds 

 of slate rests a large bed of greenstone ; it weathers readily, and 

 and falls to sandy grains ; on this account the people call it sand- 

 stone. It is often divided into four-sided columns perpendicular 

 to the stratum upon which it rests. 



These rocks, of which the transition formation of Westgoth- 

 land is formed, occur in three places completely separated from 

 each other ; and it is highly probable that no connexion ever 

 existed between them, because the relative thickness of these 

 strata is different, and not a trace of transition rocks is seen 

 between them, while it rises on these three hills to a very consi- 

 derable height. The first and largest mass of transition rocks 

 occurs near Falkjoping, where a large plain of sandstone extends 

 from the sources of the river Lidaa to the mouth of the river 

 Tidaa over nearly 30 miles. Upon this plain rest three similar 

 plains of limestone, separated from each other by narrow valleys, 

 and each of them containing two or three summits of trap. Ihe 

 first of these limestone plains called Storfalan (the large common), 

 is remarkable for its fertility ; it lias two summits of trap, the 

 Mossebergand Aalleberg; the second limestone plain is Taare- 

 dalsberg ; and the third, Bilhngen, almost entirely covered by the 

 bed of trap. The alternation of hard and soft stone in these moun- 

 tains, occasions the formation of terraces in all of them, and the 

 whole trap family has received its name from the stair-like 

 appearance of these hills ; trapp in Swedish signifying stair, 



Kinnekulle, a hill on the south side of the lake Weneren, con- 

 sists of the same rocks, but the limestone is only 150 feet thick, 

 and the summit of clayslate and trap rises 470 feet above the 

 limestone ; but it is impossible to ascertain how thick each of 

 these two strata is. The whole thickness of the horizontal beds 

 at the Kinnekulle is 730 feet. Halle and Kennebercr are two 

 other hills of transition rocks at the mouth of the Gothaelf, near 

 Wenersberg. -The clayslate and alumslate are each only about 

 50 feet thick ; the limestone seems to be altogether wanting, 

 and the trap on the Hunneberg is 128 feet; on the Hal eberg 

 166 feet thick. Peculiar to Westgothland are : entomostracites 

 paradoxissimus, the largest of the whole tribe, which, according 

 to some detached parts, must sometimes have been about a foot 



