Permian System. ^13 



summer of 1841, and announced the discovery, that these 

 newer red sand deposits, covering an enormous portion of 

 European Russia, constitute a separate zoological system, 

 distinct in age from the Trias, and comprehending, in ascend- 

 ing order, our lower new red sandstone (the rothe-todte-Uegende 

 of Germany), our magnesian limestone (the Zechstein of Ger- 

 many), and the sandstones and conglomerates that constitute 

 the lower member of the hunter, or variegated sandstone of 

 the Germans (represented by the Gres des Vosges of France) ; 

 and leaving the Trias, composed of Upper Bunter-sandstein, 

 Muschelkalk and Keuper, as the lowest of the secondary 

 rocks, and the commencement of new orders in various forms 

 of life. Sir R. Murchison maintained the same views in his 

 address of 1843 ; and in the spring of 1844, in a paper which 

 he read to this Society, he gave a full confirmation of the 

 correctness of his original conclusions, after a more carefiil 

 examination of the fossils collected from the Permian series 

 in Russia, and comparison of them with those collected in 

 different parts of Germany and Poland, which countries he 

 visited for the special purpose of examining in situ the char- 

 acters of the lower members of the new red sandstone series 

 in their long-established typical forms. The Permian sys- 

 tem, therefore, consists of a series of conglomerates, sand- 

 stones, clays, marls, common limestones, and magnesian lime- 

 stones, all under a great variety of forms, and intermediate 

 between the Carboniferous and Triassic groups. It contains 

 a peculiar fauna and flora, mingled, however, with a propor- 

 tion of the animal and vegetable remains of the Carbonifer- 

 ous series, on which its beds repose, and thus connected with 

 the palaeozoic class of deposits ; whereas the Triassic series, 

 which succeeds in ascending order, has not yet been found, 

 it is said, to contain any palaeozoic form, whether animal or 

 vegetable. The Permian system, the authors of the *' Geo- 

 logy of Russia" observe, constitutes the remnant of the ear- 

 lier creation of animals, and exhibits the last of the partial 

 and successive alterations which those creatures underwent 

 before their final disappearance. The dwindling away and 

 extinction of many of the types, produced and multiplied in 

 such profusion during the anterior epochs, and the creation 

 of a new class of large animals, the Saurians, clearly an- 



VOL. XLI. NO. LXXXT. — JULY 1S46. U 



