SO-CALLED " METAMORPHIC" SYSTEM. 77 



" Primary," "Metamorphic," "Azoic," and "Hypozoic,"* or, 

 in other words, as marking the earliest stages of world- 

 history, and "before life had "begun to make its appearance 

 on our planet. 



This view, however, like many others of the earlier 

 geologists, has had to give way to more extended research 

 and newer discovery. Even during the time of the Ger- 

 man geologist Werner, a large portion of these primary 

 strata was found to be partially fossiliferous, and separated 

 under the term " Transition," as indicating the passage of 

 the world from an uninhabitable to a habitable state. In 

 our own time these Transition rocks (as will be more fully 

 explained in a subsequent sketch) have been subdivided 

 into " Silurian " and " Cambrian " systems, both of which 

 have yielded abundant forms of life; and still more re- 

 cently, in the schists and serpentines of the St Lawrence 

 the equivalents of the old gnarled gneiss-rocks of Scotland 

 and Norway traces of lowly life have been discovered, this 

 giving rise to the " Laurentian " system the oldest or 

 earliest strata in which fossils have yet been detected. Or, 

 tabulating the progress, we have first the PRIMARY of the 

 earlier geologists resolved into Transition and Metamor- 

 phic ; secondly, the TRANSITION resolved into Silurian and 

 Cambrian; and, lastly, the METAMORPHIC resolved into 

 Laurentian and Older Crystalline Schists ; thus 



( TRANSITION. J SILURIAN SYSTEM. 

 PRIMARY. I CAMBRIAN 



I METAMORPHIC. [ J^UKENTIAN 



v, ( OLDER CRYSTALLINE SCHISTS. 



Here, then, it is obvious that what has hitherto been espe- 

 cially regarded as the metamorphic system is merely a 



* Primary, first or earliest formed ; Metamorphic, changed or trans- 

 formed in texture ; Azoic, without life, or destitute of fossil remains ; 

 w, under life, or lying beneath the fossiliferous formations. 



