12 KEPORT— 1880. 



Neither do I tliink that the Permian strata of Russia, as de- 

 scribed by Sir Roderick Murchison, were necessarily, as he implies, 

 deposited in a wide ocean. According to his view all marine life 

 universally declined to a minimum after the close of the Carboniferous 

 period, that decline beginning with the Permian and ending with the 

 Triassic epoch. Those who believe in the doctrine of evolution will find 

 it hard to accept the idea which this implies, namely, that all the prolific 

 forms of the Jurassic series sprang from the scanty faunas of the Permian 

 and Triassic epochs. On the contrary, it seems to me more rational to 

 attribute the poverty of the faunas of these epochs to accidental abnormal 

 conditions in certain areas, that for a time partially disappeared during 

 the deposition of the continental Muschelkalk which is absent in the 

 British Triassic series. 



In the whole of the Russian Permian strata only fifty-three species 

 were known at the time of the publication of ' Russia and the Ural 

 Mountains,' and I have not heard that this scanty list has been subse- 

 quently increased. I am therefore inclined to believe that these red marls, 

 grits, sandstones, conglomerates, and great masses of gypsum and rock- 

 salt were all formed in a flat inland area which was occasionally liable to 

 be invaded by the sea during intermittent intervals of minor depression, 

 sonaetimes in one area, sometimes in another, and the fauna small in size 

 and poor in numbers is one of the results, while the deposition of beds of 

 salt and gypsum is another. If so, then in the area now called Russia, in 

 sheets of inland Permian water, deposits were formed strictly analogous 

 to those of Central Europe and of Britain, but on a larger scale. 



Other deposits of salt deep beneath overlying younger strata are stated 

 to occur at Bromberg in Prussia, and many more might be named as 

 lying in the same formation in northern Germany. 



If we now turn to the Triassic series it is known that it consists of 

 only two chief members in Britain, the Bunter Sandstones and the Keuper 

 or New Red Marls, the Muschelkalk of the Continent being absent in our 

 islands. No salt is found in the Bunter sandstones of England, but it 

 occurs in these strata at Schoningeu in Brunswick and also near Hanover. 

 In the lower part of the Keuper series deposits of rock-salt are common in 

 England and Ireland. At Almersleben, near Calbe, rock-salt is found in 

 the Muschelkalk, and also at Erfurt and Slottenheim in Thuringia and at 

 Wilhelmsgliick in Wurtemburg. In other Triassic areas it is known 

 at Honigsen, in Hanover, in middle Keuper beds. In the red shales at 

 Sperenberg and Lieth on the Lower Elbe, salt was found at the depth of 

 3,000 feet, and at Stassfnrth the salt is said to be ' several hundred yards 

 thick.' 



In Central Spain rock-salt is known, and at Tarragona, Taen, and also 

 at Santander in the north of Spain, all in Triassic strata. Other locali- 

 ties may be named in the Upper Trias, such as the Salzkammergut, 

 Aussee, Hallstatt, Ischl, Hallein in Salzburg, Halle in the Tyrol, and 

 Berchesgaden in Bavaria. 



