TRANSACTIONS OF THE SECTIONS. 107 
portion of the shores of the White Sea. This system consists of flag- 
stone, clays, marls, cornstones and sandstones, the whole bearing a con- 
siderable resemblance to the red deposits of the same age in our isles, 
from which, however, they differ in containing copious salé springs, and 
much gypsum. It was the occurrence of so much salt and gypsum, 
that led previous writers to consider these deposits an equivalent 
of our new red system, which, being found to contain these minerals 
in our own parts of Europe, had been even termed by some, the salife- 
rous system. That the red deposits (red and green) are, however, 
the true equivalents of our old red sandstone, is demonstrated, not 
only by order of superposition, but also by the many organic remains 
which they offer. Fishes are the distinguishing fossils of this great 
Russian system, and among these are species (notably the Holoptychius 
Nobilissimus, Murchison, with Coccosteus, Diplopterus,)and other forms 
which occur in deposits of the same age in Scotland. These fishes are 
in abundance, and a beautiful work, illustrative of them, is now pre- 
paring by Professor Asmus, of Dorpat. The authors have traced 
these fish-beds for many hundred miles, and occupying several stages 
in the system, each stage characterized by peculiar species*. 
The zoological contents of this system are also of great value in 
illustrating and confirming the palzozoic classification proposed by 
Messrs. Sedgwick and Murchison; or in other words, the evidences 
found in Russia leave no doubt that the old red and Devonian systems 
of rocks are identical. Terebratule, Spirifers, Euomphali, Bellerophons, 
and other shells distinct from those of the carboniferous system, but 
similar to those which occur in Devonshire, Westphalia, Belgium, and 
other places (in deposits which have been shown by these authors to 
be of the age of the old red sandstone), are associated in Russia with 
the fossil fishes of the old red sandstone of the British Isles. 
3. Carboniferous System.—tIn the northern regions of Russia, the 
lower or calcareous part only of the carboniferous system exists, and 
it is seen in many places to overlie the old red sandstone. The inferior 
beds consist of incoherent sandstones and bituminous shale, which 
sometimes contain thin beds of impure pyritous coal, and impressions 
of several plants well known in the carboniferous system of our 
own islands. These are surmounted by various bands of limestone, 
the lowest of which only have occasionally some mineralogical resem- 
blance to the mountain limestone of Western Europe ; other beds being 
lithologically undistinguishable from the magnesian limestone of En- 
gland ; others from a pisolite; a third and very prevalent band of 
considerable thickness is milk-white, and not more compact than the 
calcaire grossier of Paris. This white Productus limestone was traced 
by the authors from the neighbourhood of Moscow to beyond Arch- 
angel (and they ascertained that it ranged far into the country of the 
Samoiedes), a distance of not less than 1000 miles. This formation 
* Professor Agassiz being present at the meeting of the Association, confirmed 
the views of the authors. In the red and green beds which underlie the car- 
boniferous strata, a remarkable bone-bed contains scales of Holoptychius, 
Coccosteus, Diplopterus, so characteristic of the old red sandstone of Scot- 
land. 
