296 Geoloyical Society, 



the collection has been placed in the Geological Department of 

 the University ^Museum, Oxford. These fossils were forwai'ded 

 by Prof. W. J. Sollas to Prof. C. Lapworth, who embodied the 

 results of his study in a Report, of which the following is a brief 

 abstract. 



The specimens are -recorded as all occurring in the same lo(!ality, 

 but it is not known whether they were obtained from a single zone. 

 The majority of the rock-specimens in which the graptolites occur 

 are black and somewhat pyritous carbonaceous shales, usuall}'' well 

 bedded and uncleaved, and the graptolites are in general well 

 preserved. The lithology of the containing rocks and the mode of 

 preservation of the graptolites are similar to those obtaining in 

 the richest gi*aptolite-bearing strata of Britain, Europe, and North 

 America. 



The forms apparently represented in the collection are Lorjano- 

 graptus logani Hall, a new species of Goniograptus (.''), DiJgmo- 

 graptus stabilia EUes & Wood and D. hifidus Hall, Fhyllograptus 

 angusf/foh'usHaW, Glossograptiis a ca 71 f Jii'S ^Ihi^ & 'Wood, Crgpto- 

 graptus tricornis Hall, var., Amplexograptus confertus Lapworth, 

 and A. coelatus Lapworth. 



Taken as a whole, this graptolite fauna may best be compared 

 with that of the Upper Arenig formation of Britain and its North- 

 American equivalents, answering to the Lower Llanvirnian of 

 Hicks & Marr and the Didijmograp)fus-hrfidus Zone of EUes & 

 Wood and H.M. Geological Survey. 



The assemblage of graptolites discovered in Bolivia a few 3'ears 

 ago b}' Dr. J. W. Evans con-esponds very closely with this Peruvian 

 fauna, and was probably derived from the southward continuation 

 of the same Andean graptolite-band. The Peruvian forms in the 

 Douglas collection, like those from Bolivia, admit almost as close a 

 parallelism with those of the Arenig-Llandeilo graptolite-beds of 

 Australia and New Zealand as with their representatives in the 

 Northern Hemisphere. 



Not only is the Douglas Collection of Peruvian graptolites 

 instructive and valuable from the palseontological point of view, 

 owing to the number and the good state of preservation of the 

 species represented, but it is of especial interest from the palaeo- 

 graphical aspect, as affording additional proof of the identity 

 (in general facies) of the graptolite fauna of the sea-waters of 

 Lower Ordovician times in those regions of the globe Avhich are 

 now occupied by some of the dry lands of Britain, Eastern North 

 America, Peru, Bolivia, Victoria, and New Zealand. Thus it greatly 

 strengthens the inference that in Arenig-Llandeilo times there 

 was open-sea communication admitting of the circulation of sea- 

 currents along some as yet undetennined line or lines, connecting 

 the above-mentioned regions, which must have extended across the 

 Equator and apparently throughout a length nearly equal to that 

 of half the circumference of the globe. 



