146 



It would appear, therefore, at the close of the Triassic period, 

 several typical forms of Actinozoa, that were to play an 

 important part in the seas of the Oolitic period, had made their 

 appearance before its dawn. 



The Lias formation at one time was supposed to be destitute 

 of a Coral fauna, but the progress of discovery has shown that 

 this was a hasty conclusion. Many years ago I collected masses of 

 Septastrcea from the Lower Lias near Evesham and Worcester, 

 and from the A. planorbis beds of Street, which satisfied me 

 that in process of time specimens of these Corals would be found 

 in other localities. The late Mr. Hugh Millee'' has given an 

 account of a Coral bed in the Lower Lias which he observed at 

 Skye. " The stratum," he says, " of from two to three feet in 

 thickness, seems wholly built up of irregularly formed rubbly 

 concretions, and that every seeming concretion in the bed is a 

 perfectly formed Coral of the genus Astrwa. Their surfaces, 

 wherever they have been washed by the sea, are of great beauty; 

 nothing can be more irregular than the outhne of each mass, 

 and yet scarce anything more regular than the sculpturings on 

 every part of it. We find them fretted over with polygons 

 like those of a honeycomb, only somewhat less mathematically 

 exact, and the centre of every polygon contains its many-rayed 

 star." This is, doubtless, the same Coral bed that was found 

 by my friend A. Geikie, Esq., E.G.S.,* at Lussay, Isle of Skye, 

 underlying the Calcareous Grit and Sandstone of the Lower 

 Lias, and resting on a thin band of hard blue Limestone, beneath 

 which is a stratum of greenish micaceous nodular Sandstone, 

 containing Gardinia concinna, Ziet. These Corals had been 

 noticed by Sir R. MtrRCHisoN ® as Polypifers of the geniis Astrcea, 

 and compared to the Coralline bodies found in the Lias at 

 Ledbury, near Bridgwater. 



In describing this Coral (which I dedicated to my friend Sir 

 EoDEKicK Murchison, who had first noticed it in situ) I observed" 



^ Cruise of the Betsy, p. 144. 

 * Quart. Jour. Geol. Soc, vol. xiv, p. 21. 

 '' Trans. Geol. Soc., 2 series, vol. ii, p. 368. 

 ^^ Quar. Jour. Geol. Soc, vol. xiv., p. .S5. 



