6 ON THE FOSSIL FOOT-MARKS 



"coal formation" being classed with the transition or secondary rocks, says, "this has 

 always been debateable ground. (N, Y. Reports, p. 13.) And farther on, when speaking 

 of the coal-bearing rocks, he says they commence "at the top of the Devonian or the Old 

 Red Sandstone and Catskill group." (p. 14.) 



It was not until the meeting of the American Association of August last, that I was 

 aware of there being a doubt in the mind of any American geologist of the Old Red Sand- 

 stone of Europe having its analogue in the United States. Professor Rogers then re- 

 marked, that he " did not admit the red sandstone of this epoch to be the Old Red Sandstone 

 of Europe," and he denied that " the Old Red Sandstone existed in the United States at all." 

 This opinion is at variance with that of all the American geologists, so far as I know, 

 and that of the two most distinguished European geologists who have examined, with 

 great care, the extended palneozoic strata of the United States, Verneuil and Lyell.* 

 The latter, in his Travels, (vol. 2, p. 255, and in his Map,) makes the Tully limestone 

 (No. 25,) the Genesee slate, (No. 26,) Portage group, (No. 27,) and Chemung group, 

 (No. 28,) to embrace the Devonian period. And in another place he says, when de- 

 scribing the Tioga coal field, that " beneath the millstone grit are those red and gray 

 sandstones already alluded to, as corresponding in mineral character, fossils and position 

 with our "Old Red." (Vol. i., p. 62.) Verneuil embraces a wider extent for the Devonian, 

 and begins it with the Oriskany sandstone, (No. 18,) and terminates with the Catskill 

 group, (No. 29.) This wide range includes Formations 7, 8, 9, 10 and 11 of the Penn- 

 sylvania Survey. And in regard to the high authority of the palaeontologist of the New 

 York Survey, M. Verneuil says, " we have had occasion to recognise the exactness of the 

 observations of this able geologist, and we only differ from him in opinion upon the age 

 and the true equivalents of the black bituminous shales and of the principal mass of the 

 micaceous sandstones which overlie them in the states of Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky." 

 (Am. Journ., vol. v., p. 182.) Mr. Hall says, the Devonian system "comprises the five 

 superior groups of the Helderberg division, the six groups of the Erie division, and the 

 Old Red Sandstone." (Am. Journ., vol. 5, p. 366.) And he farther says, " It is incontesta- 

 ble that the red sandstone which forms its superior part, and which is so powerful on the 

 frontiers of the states of New York and Pennsylvania, is upon the same horizon as the 

 Old Red Sandstone of Scotland and Wales." (p. 367.) 



* M. Verneuil, in his Memoir "sur la Parallelisme des Depots Paleozoiques," places the Catskill group 

 (which he designates as No. 28, but which is really No. 29 of Mr. Hall's Table,) in the Devonian system, and 

 calls it "Vieux gres rouge." After his remarks on Nos. 26 and 27 of the New York Reports, he says, "Pour 

 terminer celle revue rapide de la serie paleozoique de I'fitats de New York il ne nous reste qu'a dire quelques 

 mots des masses puissantes de vieu.x gres rouge qui ferment les montagnes de Catskill, et qui, se prolongeant le 

 long de frontieres de la Pennsylvanie penetrent dans I'interieur de cet fitat. . . . ou Ton trouve quelquefois des 

 fragments de poissons analogues a ceux du vieiix gres rouge d'Ecosse et de Russie tels que I'Holoptichus 

 noblissimus." (page 17.) 



The able paleontologist, Mr. Sharpe, who examined, compared and tabulated the pala;ozoic fossils taken from 

 this country by Sir Charles Lyell, considers the Old Red Sandstone of the " New York system to close with the 

 Chemung group, which is surmounted by a formation of sandstone, considered identical with our Old Red Sand- 

 stone." (Proceedings Geol. Soc, vol. 4, p. 155.) 



