SINIAN IN THE TS'lN-UNG. 45 



The Ki-sin-ling thus includes at least upper Lower Cambrian at the 

 base, and extends up to middle Ordovician (Trenton), at which horizon 

 it passes by transition into shales, which are probably of Silurian or 

 Devonian age. 



Sinian strata are not definitely known by fossils to occur southeast of 

 the Yang-tzi' in southeastern China, but both von Richthofen and Loczy,* 

 with strong probability, refer certain strata, the Ta-ho grits and Lu-shan 

 slates, to the period. 



Sinian strata have not been recognized in characteristic limestones or 

 identified by fossils in the Ts'in-ling-shan, yet they are in all probability 

 present. Von Richthofen did not hold this view.f He wrote: 



The eastern Kuen-lung remained free from the Sinian transgression south of the 

 northern base of the Fu-niu-shan and the Ts'in-ling-shan, and the adjacent region on the 

 south. 



Briefly the facts are as follows: In three sections across the Ts'in-ling 

 range, observed by von RichthofenJ and ourselves, metamorphic schists of 

 the Wu-t'ai type are succeeded by a basal conglomerate, quartzitic rocks, 

 and gray limestone. There is a great series of slates, and also carbonace- 

 ous limestone, which locally carries coal. Our observations of the relations 

 of these strata are delineated on the geological atlas sheet ai, and while not 

 conclusive, they indicate that the order of stratigraphic sequence is from the 

 conglomerate, through quartzite, limestone, and slate, to the coal-bearing 

 limestone. We agree with von Richthofen that the last-named is Carbon- 

 iferous, but think it is distinct from the gray limestone, which corresponds 

 with the Ki-sin-ling (Sinian) in position beneath a thickness of middle 

 Paleozoic shales. If our understanding is correct, the Sinian is present in a 

 mid-section of the Ts'in-ling-shan, near the northern base of the range. 



There is but little knowledge regarding the Sinian system northwest of 

 the Ts'in-ling-shan. Loczy assigns various occurrences of limestone, which 

 he describes as early Paleozoic, to the system, but as a rule, in the fact that 

 they are highly siliceous, they much more nearly resemble the pre-Cambrian 

 limestones of the Nan-k'ou system than they do the Sinian. However, in 

 the vicinity of Que-ta, latitude 36, longitude 102, west of Lan-ch6u-fu, he 

 observed in a small mountain range known as the "Cha-ji-shan" a heavily 

 bedded limestone, in part dark and bituminous, in part lighter colored and 

 somewhat interbedded with shale and sandstone, which exhibits an oolitic 

 nodular structure such as is found also in the globulitic limestones of the 

 Sinian. He regards this as a characteristic occurrence of the Sinian lime- 



*Reise des Orafen Sz6chenyi, vol. i, p. 380, map. 

 t China, vol. n, p. 713. 

 id., vol. n, p. 565. 



