58 PALEOZOIC TIME. [CHAP. V. 



which may be more truly called Upper Old Eed, since they 

 contain fish-remains of the Old Bed Sandstone type, and 

 they resemble the upper sandstones of Wales and Ireland. 

 In Fife and Forfar these consist of red conglomerates and 

 sandstones, surmounted by yellow sandstones and shales, 

 which are sometimes called the Dura Den beds, from a 

 locality near Cupar, whence many fine specimens of fish 

 have been obtained. Similar sandstones occur in Elgin on 

 the Moray Firth. 



In Ireland the Upper Old Eed Sandstone is confined to 

 the southern part of the country. It sets in below the 

 Carboniferous limestone and shale of Kilkenny and Water- 

 ford. Where best developed it is 3,200 feet thick, and 

 consists of a basement conglomerate overlain by red and 

 purple sandstones and red shales, above which are yellow 

 and greenish sandstones with olive green shales. These 

 last are known as the Kiltorcan Beds, and they contain the 

 freshwater mollusc Anodon Jukesii, together with numerous 

 plants, fish, and large Crustacea, and the beds are believed 

 to be lacustrine. 



Beds of the same age and of similar aspect are seen at 

 various localities in Tipperary, Limerick, Cork, and Kerry, 

 so that they are believed to underlie nearly the whole of 

 the south of Ireland, but they are absent over certain tracts 

 in the west of Kerry, as mentioned on a previous page 

 (p. 54). In the Dingle promontory there are thick red con- 

 glomerates, estimated to be more than 2,000 feet, succeeded 

 toward Tralee by 1,500 feet of the Yellow Sandstone group ; 

 in Clare and Limerick they are very much thinner, and 

 they are believed to die out along a line drawn from 

 Galway Bay to Queen's County, and thence southward 

 through Kilkenny. 



