354< Prof. Sedgwick and Mr. Murchison's Supplementary 



sion may have been communicated to persons not well ac« 

 quainted with the progress of geological investigation, and I 

 shall gladly embrace the opportunity afforded by a new edi- 

 tion of my map to supply the omission, and to add my un- 

 equivocal testimony to the originality and value of the dis- 

 coveries regarding the sequence of Devonian strata which 

 heralded the new and remarkable views contained in your 

 last Number. I am, my dear Sir, yours, &c. 



John Phillips. 



LVI. Stipplementary Remarks on the " Dexwnian " System of 

 Reel's. By the Rev. Professor S^oawiCK, F.R.S., F.G.S., 

 and Roderick Impey Murchison, Esq., F.R.S. F.G.S.* 



"VITE beg to offer a few additional observations on the classi- 

 ' * fication of the older rocks of Devon and Cornwall, as 

 a supplement to our paper in the last Number of this Journal. 



In briefly alluding to the geologists who had at different 

 times suggested, that certain portions of these rocks (in South 

 Devon) might be the equivalents of the carboniferous lime- 

 stone or old red sandstone, we inadvertently omitted to state, 

 that in regard to North Devon, our distinguished leader Mr. 

 William Smith had long ago I'epresented f the band of red 

 rocks, which extend along the coast from Combe Martin to 

 the North Foreland, and thence into the Quantock Hills, 

 as old red sandstone. At that early period, however, this 

 author had not the materials for an extension of his first cor- 

 rect glance : neither the order of superposition, nor the fossils 

 of the succeeding strata, were then known ; and hence, rely- 

 ing chiefly upon mineral characters, and not upon that great 

 principle, q/' identfymg strata by their organic remains, by 

 which he had so successfully eliminated the true order of the 

 secondary formations. Smith did not succeed in referring any 

 other part of Devonshire or Cornwall to what we consider 

 its proper place in the geological series. Thus, we find 

 him equally classing as old red sandstone, a course of red 

 rocks which may be traced across a considerable part of 

 Devonshire, a little south of Bideford, and which we have 

 shown to be a mass included in the culm or coal measui'es of 

 the county. Again, he placed the limestones of Holcombe 

 Rogus, &c., which we also include in the same carboniferous 

 tract, as subordinate to the new red sandstone ; and in com- 

 mon with all who preceded or followed him up to the period 

 when we published our views in 1836, he considered the black 



* Communicated by the Authors. 



t Smith's Geological Map of England and Wales. 



