516 THE DEVONIAN PERIOD. 



together with many quite perfect specimens of several hitherto known 

 only as fragments. Of the latter was a large frond of Neuropteris 

 polymorijha^ Dawson. 



" In the following section, the measurements were taken along a line 

 crossing the beds at right angles to their strike, from high-water 

 mark near the bathing-house stairs, to low-water mark. The rich 

 fossiliferous shale-beds, or plant-beds^ as I shall term them, are 

 numbered from below upwards, for convenience of reference. The 

 thickness and lithological character of these beds vary somewhat in 

 their different exposures. The position of one or two plant-beds 

 appearing elsewhere at this locality, but not observed on the line of 

 section, is indicated. I have given lists of all the plants, etc., 

 described, which I have collected from each plant-bed, with some 

 remarks on their mode of occurrence, and I have noticed some of the 

 undescrlbed species. 



" The following section begins at the base of the Dadoxylon sand- 

 stone beds, at their junction with the trappean beds of the Bloomsbury 

 group, which form the high land skirting the shore to the northward, 

 and takes up the overlying beds in ascending order : — 



" Section of the Little River Group at the ^Fern Ledges^ Lancaster^ N.B. 



By Mr C. F. Hartt. 



Heavy beds of gray sandstone and flags (Dadoxylon sandstone). 



Dadoxylon Ouangondianum, Daws., Calamites, etc. 



Thickness, by estimation, 300 feet. 



Under this head I have classed all the beds underlying the Plant- 

 bed No. 1, which I am disposed to regard as the lowest of the rich 

 plant-bearing layers, and the base of the Cordaite shales. These beds 

 occupy the low ground lying between the ridge of the Bloomsbury 

 group and the shore. They are covered by drift, and show themselves 

 only in limited outcrops, and in the ledges on the shore. In the 

 western part of the ledges they are thrown forward on the beach by 

 a fault, forming a prominent mass of rock, in the summit of which a 

 fine trunk of Dadoxylon is seen embedded in the sandstone. Recent 

 excavations made in these beds in quarrying stone for building pur- 

 poses, in the eastern part of the locality, where the rocks are very 

 much broken up by dislocations, have exposed numerous badly pre- 

 served impressions of large trunks of this tree. 



Plant-bed No. 1 Thickness, 1 foot. 



Black arenaceous shale, varying from a fissile sandstone to a semi- 

 papyraceous shale, very fine-grained and very fissile, charged most 



