460 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vi. 



ADDITIONAL NOTES ON THE TACONIC CONTRO- 

 VERSY. 



By E. Billings, F.G.S. 



In the last, number of this journal I stated that the error in 

 regard to the age of the Taconic rocks, was corrected by the in- 

 vestigations of the Geological Survey of Canada. I now propose 

 to advance some further evidence in support of that averment. 

 The question was decided chiefly by our discoveries at Point 

 Levis, in May, 1860. 



A trilobite that had been collected in the Georgia slates, was 

 sent to me by Col. Jewett, in April, 1859. I considered that 

 its occurrence in that group of rocks, was very much in favour 

 of the views of Dr. Emmons. It is to this that he refers in his 

 letter, published in my former note, where he says, " I had for 

 years past looked upon the subject with a kind of indifierence, 

 until you had expressed to Col. Jewett opinions favourable to 

 the existence of the lower rocks I had contended for." 



I did not publish my opinion, but when afterwards Prof. Hall 



described and figured three trilobites from the same locality, I 



sent his pamphlet to Barrande, and called his attention to them 



as a group of primordial fossils, in a formation which was by the 



principal geologists of America, considered to be of the age of 



the Hudson River group. I saw that the f\icts could only be 



explained in one of two ways — either Dr. Emmons was right, or 



the trilobites constituted a sort of a colony of primordial fossils, 



in the Lower Silurian. The following are some extracts from 



Barrande's letter in reply : 



'' Paris, 28th May, 1860. 

 " My Dear Sir, 



''A short time ago I received your letter of the 25th April, and at 

 the same time the three Decades with two pamphlets, equally impor- 

 tant for me. * * * 



" You will see shortly^ in the Bulletin my observations on the sub- 

 ject of Paradoxides Harlani^ which I consider as identical with Para- 

 doxides spinosus of Bohemia ; that opinion dates back to 1851. Being- 

 then in London, at the British Museum, they presented to me for de- 

 termination, a cast sent from the United States under the name of 

 P. Harlani. After having examined it, I was convinced that this 

 cast had been made from a Bohemian specimen, which had been sent 



