ON THE CRETACEOUS FOSSILS IN ABERDEENSHIRE. 337 



it show tlmt it corresponds to the Lower Greensand of the Isle of Wight. 

 Mr. Jukes Browne's report is appended in full. 



APPENDIX. 



Rejiort on a Collection of Fossils from Moreseat, Aberdeen, 

 By A. J. JuKKs Browne, B.A., F.G.S. 



The existence of Cretaceous fossils, embedded in a kind of ' Green- 

 sand,' and found at Moreseat, near Aberdeen, has been known to 

 geologists for nearly fifty years. Mr. W. Ferguson discussed them in a 

 paper read before the Philosophical Society of Glasgow in 1849, and 

 subsequently communicated to the ' Philosophical Magazine.' ' In this 

 he observes that most of the remains are casts, and he mentions the 

 occurrence of several species of Ammonites and Belemnites, as also of 

 Cardium, Terehratula, Trochus, Solarium, Cerithium, and Spatangus. 



Some of Mr. Ferguson's fossils were examined and named oy 

 Mr. J. W. Salter in 1857,^ who gave a list of fourteen species, two of 

 them being Ammonites doubtfully referred to — Am. Selliguinus, Brong., 

 and Am. I'ailletianus, d'Orb. Four of the others he describes as new 

 species, and from the remaining six he comes to the conclusion that the 

 fauna is of Upper Greensand age. 



From 1857 to 1896 no further light was thrown on the subject, but in 

 the latter year some of the fossils collected by Messrs. Mitchell and Insch 

 M'ere submitted to Messrs. Sharman and Newton, who made a careful 

 examination of them, and communicated the results to the 'Geological 

 Magazine.' ^ They compared these fossils with the specimens described by 

 Salter, which are preserved in the Museum of Practical Geology, and 

 found the matrix to be the same. They also state that though slight 

 differences are noticeable in different pieces of the rock, yet all the samples 

 are ' so similar that one can scarcely question their having been originally 

 derived from the same bed.' 



They found, however, that many of the fossils could not be identified 

 with any Upper Greensand species, but were Lower Cretaceous forms, 

 many of them identical with those occurring in the Speeton Clay. They 

 admitted, however, a few species which occur in the Upper Cretaceous 

 series only, and have not been found in any British Lower Cretaceous 

 deposit. Hence they conclude ' that the faunas which in the south mark 

 the distinct horizons of Lower Greensand, Gault, and Upper Greensand 

 are here in Aberdeenshire included in one bed of nearly uniform character 

 throughout.' This conclusion certainly invested the Moreseat fossils with 

 still greater interest than they possessed before. 



A collection of the fossils was sent to me by the Rev. John Milne in 

 September 1896, but it was impossible for me to examine them in time to 

 report on them before the meeting of the British Association in that year. 

 I have since, however, given them careful attention, and have received 

 much assistance from Messrs. Sharman and Newton, whose previous 

 acquaintance with many of the species has saved me much time and 

 labour. 



It is not an easy task to identify these Moreseat fossils, for they are 



' Phil. Mag., vol. xxxviii. p. 430 (1850). 



' Quart. Jovrn. Geol. Soc, vol. xiii. p. 83. 



» Cfeol. Mag., Dec. 4, vol. iii. p. 247. 

 1897. Z 



