84 THE STORY OF THE EARTH AND MAN. 



interesting coral limestones in the world the corni- 

 ferous limestone was deposited. In process of time, 

 however, these clear waters became shallow, and were 

 invaded by muddy sediments ; and in the Upper 

 Devonian the swarapy flats and muddy shallows return 

 in full force, and in some degree anticipate the still 

 greater areas of this kind which existed in the suc- 

 ceeding Coal formation. 



Such is a brief sketch of the Devonian, or, as it may 

 be better called in America, from the vast develop- 

 ment of its beds on the south side of Lake Erie, the 

 Erian formation. In America the marine beds of 

 the Devonian were deposited on the same great con- 

 tinental plateau which supported the seas of the 

 Upper and Lower Silurian, and the beds were thicker 

 towards the east and thinned towards the west, as in 

 the case of the older series. But in the Devonian 

 there was much land in the north-east of America ; 

 and on the eastern margin of this land, as in Gaspe 

 and New Brunswick, the deposits throughout the 

 whole period were sandstones and shales, without 

 the great coral limestones of the central plateau. 

 Something of the same kind occurred in Europe, 

 where, however, the area of Devonian sea was smaller. 

 There the fossiliferous limestones of the Middle 

 Devonian in Devon, in the Eifel district, in France 

 and in Russia, represent the great corniferous lime- 

 stone of America; while the sandstones of South 

 Wales, of Ireland, and of Scotland, resemble the 

 local conditions of Gaspe and New Brunswick, and 



