1888] MAEYLAND ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. 15 



laminar ferruginous sandstone. Here, at the southern end of 

 Mount Misery, the lower marls are very pasty, and form a 

 sticky plastic clay wherever they are penetrated by the water 

 which soaks through the hill. Near the level of high tide 

 these beds rest upon a thin layer of more or less flaky alumin- 

 ous ferruginous sandstone, beneath which occurs a coarse ferru- 

 ginous sand. No doubt these beds will contribute a supply of 

 fossils when they become thoroughly investigated, but hitherto 

 they have yielded only a few specimens of Gryphea vesicularis, 

 Exogyra costata, and a fragment of an Ammonite, besides the 

 numerous casts, impressions, and bits of shells which are scat- 

 tered through their more elevated portions.* The tough tex- 

 ture of most parts of the Lower Marl beds in this region 

 renders the collecting of fossils very laborious, and in such 

 places much excavation yields but a small number of speci- 

 mens. The greater proportion of these fossils are also in the 

 condition of sand-casts coated with a film of brown iron stain, 

 and others are so involved in the ferruginous sandstone as to 

 be scarcely recognizable. It has, however, been my good 

 fortune during the past summer to find more perfect specimens 

 of these iron-stained casts, which displayed the form and even 

 the delicate markings of the exterior in a scarcely mistakable 

 manner. Among these we may mention Badula reticulata 

 Lyell, R. pelagica Morton, Clhota obe.sa Whitf , Mytilus oblivius 

 Whitf., Dosinia erecta Whitf., Oardium perelonr/atum Whitf., 

 C. eufalense Con., Trigonia cerulea Whitf., Pteria laripes Morton, 

 an Inoceramus, an Avicula, and a Pedcn which appears to be 

 P. tenuitestus Gabb. 



The thick shells, such as Gryphea vesieidaris and Exogyra 

 costata, occur in a better state of preservation than is common 



* It is with no intention to claim priority over the investigations of our 

 State Geologists in this field that the above names of fossils have been intro- 

 duced here, since Mr. Tyson had named specimens of both Gryphaea vesicularis 

 and Exogyra costata from the black beds near Dr. Giddings' farm on Round 

 Bay, to say nothing of his other specimens from the opposite side of the 

 Severn, and also from several places near the Patuxent and Potomac, in 

 Prince George's county. Specimens of these fossils, with names and localities 

 attached, were placed in the collection of the Maryland Academy of Sciences, 

 but by some unaccountable mischance they have disappeared, and besides 

 many others cannot now be found. 



