CAMBRIAN STRATA 297 
into only a fraction of their former horizontal extent. Further, 
the present directions of these folds tell us that the pressure came 
in a direction parallel to the Equator, the axes of the folds being 
nearly on a north and south line. However, with the opening of 
Cambrian times—a well-marked period in the earth’s later his- 
tory—the southern portion of our area was again below the sea, 
for in the Beardmore region we find beds of black limestone con- 
taining fossils of corals and of a primitive sponge-coral called 
Archeocyathus. The northern portion of Victoria Land was 
still probably dry land. The limestone is of unknown thickness, 
but its character tells us something. From its purity we can argue 
a clear though comparatively shallow sea, while from a nomher 
of limestone breccias found, we know that after consolidation it 
was broken up in places by earth-movements, or even volcanic 
eruptions, and afterwards re-cemented again. But after this 
period of deposition the land again emerged from the sea, and 
no legible record is found until much later. A record of a some- 
what illegible kind exists in a comprehensive series of granites 
which occur in profusion along the whole of the present coast- 
line. These are of infinite variety, and probably belong to many 
ages, but the majority seem to have been intruded after the 
Cambrian limestone and before the next succeeding strata. They 
were doubtless connected with the uplift of the whole region. 
In their intrusion through the pre-Cambrian schists they tore 
away and even assimilated huge blocks of schist and gneiss, which 
exist to-day as enclosures in the granite. 
At the end of Paleozoic, or beginning of Mesozoic times— 
that is, somewhat later than when the great coal-measures of 
England were being formed—the whole of the Victoria Land 
region became an area of deposition of a very interesting kind. 
For belonging to this period we find a very well-marked series 
of rocks, named by Mr. Ferrar of the Discovery Expedition the 
Beacon Sandstone. 
In the district visited by him, the Royal Society Range, the 
series is composed mainly of a dense sandstone with thin beds 
of shale, and is at least 2000 ft. thick. Farther to the north the 
series is represented by a similar sandstone, but associated with 
beds of coral, shale, and limestone. In the Beardmore district 
it appears as limestone, calcareous sandstone, beds of coal, and 
shale. There can be little doubt that these all represent de- 
