50 THE CARBONIFEROUS. 



described by Mr R, Brown, it would appear that the Lower Carboni- 

 ferous Coal measures are slenderly represented or concealed by 

 faulting. Mr Brown has, however, recognised the Millstone-grit as 

 underlying the Sydney anil Glace Bay Coal-fields, and attaining to 

 a thickness of 1800 feet. It consists largely of gray sandstone, 

 and holds Sigittarice, Calamites, and Lepidodendra. (Brown. Journal 

 Geol. Society, vol. iii. p. 258 ; Ibid., vol. vi. p. 116.) 



From a collection of fossils made by Mr It Bell in Western 

 Newfoundland, and presented to the Museum of the M'Gill University 

 by Donald Ross, Esq., it appears that the Lower Carboniferous lime- 

 stone of that island holds the same fossils with that of Nova Scotia, 

 and that it is overlaid by a series of beds corresponding to the Mill- 

 stone-grit. This formation, however, contains beds of coal of work- 

 able size, abounding in remains of Lepidodendra, so that it would 

 seem that in Newfoundland, as in Scotland, the workable coals 

 extend farther down in the series than is the case to the southward. 



For the flora of these interesting formations which form the 

 lower portion of the Carboniferous, I must refer to the Report 

 already mentioned. I may remark here in general terms, that in the 

 area of the Acadian Provinces, the close of the Devonian was 

 accompanied by great physical changes which removed the Devonian 

 flora. In the Lower Carboniferous period, a meagre flora, different 

 from that of the Devonian, took possession of the land. This was 

 again partially removed by the subsidence leading to the deposition 

 of the Lower Carboniferous limestones, and the Millstone-grit lying 

 on these, forms, as to its flora, the dawn of the great Middle Coal 

 formation. While the local elevation, subsidences, and denudations 

 within the Carboniferous period were sufficient to cause some limited 

 cases of unconformability, these are not comparable with those 

 between the Devonian and the Carboniferous; and the Devonian 

 fauna and flora are as a whole quite distinct from those of the Car- 

 boniferous, though there are some species of plants common. 



In Eastern America, as in Great Britain, the conditions of coal 

 accumulation seem to have set in earlier to the northward. The 

 _^ Coal-beds of Newfoundland belong to the Millstone-grit series. Those 

 of Pictou are exclusively in the Middle Coal series, and apparently 

 in its lower part. Those of the Joggins seem to be rather higher in 

 tin; series than those of Pictou, and in the United States there are 

 workable beds of coal in the Upper Coal measures which are barren 

 in Nova Scotia. This connects itself with the fact illustrated in my 

 Report on the Devonian Flora (1870), that this flora in North America 

 seems to have extended itself from the north-east, — a view which 



