30 .1 W. 1>AWS«>N oX CRKTACEOITS AM' TKiri'l A K'Y n.ol.'AS 



Liguitic or Fort Union Gronji. To iliis lu-loni:- Uic i>liints from rorcni>inf ("rcok and I lie 

 Sonris Kivor doscrilxnl l>y lli.' wrili'V in Dr. (!. "M. Dawson's lu'ixirt on tlu' 4'.tlh rarallfl. 

 and in tho Ki'ports oi" the (Icolosical Survey of Canada.* tlio ])lants dosirihcd l)y llcor 

 from Matkenzic IJivor.t and Iho.so of ihc Fort Union bods of tho Uppor Missouri doscribod 

 by N.'wbtMry and others. They constitute also the Lower Tertiary or Lignitic Flora of 

 Losqut>reux.t 



"With refereuee to the age of the Laramie beds, considerable diversity of opinion has 

 j>revailed. and I do not purpose here to renew the diseussions which have taken place ; 

 but merely to state what seem to lie well ascertained f;uts. These are as follows : — 



1. The Laramie beds pass downward into the undoubted Upper Cretaceous, without 

 any stratigraphieal l)reak. 



■2. Their invertel)rate fossils being largely fresh-water and estuarine and partly of Cre- 

 taceous, and jiartlv of I^ower Tertiary types, do not give very precise indications of age. l)ut 

 the beds hold reptilian remains of genera usually held to be Mesoz:oic,while no mammalian 

 remains have yet been found. 



3. According to the observations of the United States geologists, the Laramie beds 

 are known to underlie, in some places conformably, and in others unconformal)ly, the 

 Wahsatch series, which is regarded as Middle Eocene. 



4. The ilora is distinct on the one hand from that of the Cretaceous below, and on 

 the other from that of the undoubted Mioceue of British Columbia and the South-Western 

 States. 



5. The Laramie Groi\p has been subdivided on stratigraphieal grounds into four 

 sei-tions. but no grounds are known which would warrant its division into distinct forma- 

 tions. 



Clarence King, in his Geology of the 40th Parallel, places the Laramie in the Cretaceous, 

 nn till' evidence, more especially, of its vcrlclnatc rciiiaiiis, I'uzzlcd. howcvi'r, liy (he 

 confident assertions as to the Miocene aspect of certain fossil i)lants, he seems to suspect 

 that in the Fort Union series there may be a confusion of the Tertiary beds with the 

 Creta<'eous. lie places, however, without hesitation in tlie Eocene the Green liiver group, 

 who8t> plants are pla< cd l.y L'squereux witli Ihc Mioceiu'. AVhite, tlie I'ahvontologist of 

 the United States Survey of the Territories, approaches to the same general view when 

 he says in his report of IHHO, that the Laramie is "a transitional group between tlie (^-eta- 

 ceous beneatli and the Tertiary above.'\^ This was tlie ojiinion exiire.ssed liy tiie writer, 

 with reference to the (Canadian developnunt of the liaramie. in the Report of the Boundary 

 Commission in lxT-'> ; and more recently in a note on Fossil I'lants collected by Dr. 

 Selwyn.ll 



But though 1 believe 111) American geologist or pala-onloloyist would now hold 

 these beds to 1m- newer than the oldest Tertiary, I observe that lleer, in a note on tlie fossil 



• l87lt-«<». 



t Flora KowiJH Anliriu 



}T«rlisry Flrirn, <i(vilii);i<'ftl Survtiy of llio Tnrritorids orUio V. 8. 



{S»< nliio i>n|i«ni liy I'mf. SlnvunHoii in Atii. .Imirnnl of S*'!^!^^, mid in KopnrI of Wlioolor'.s Siirvoy, 1881. 



( lEi'iKirt of fiiKil. Snrvoy of Cnnniln, 1H70-.SO. 



