CARBONIFEROUS ROCKS OF THE SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE. 117 
that they have been long regarded as identical. In spite of the many 
Lower Ba cxiitocosis species, the Brachiopods, owing to the absenée 
of the P. giganleus group and the presence of Martini (Stropholasia) 
indicate that the fauna is later than Lower Carboniferous. 
The evidence of the Bryozoa agrees with that of the Brachiopods. 
The fauna is distinctively Carboniferous and nos Permian. The 
Trilobites, Griffithides, Brachymetopus, and Phillipsia indicate the 
same. 
_ Prof. Frech, however, although admitting the Carboniferous 
affinities of many of the fossils, is in favour of assigning the whole 
fauna to the Permian, mainly on the ground that some of the Spirifers 
and the genus Martinia (which includes S. Darwini and S. horrescens 
from Tasmania) are of Permian affinities. 
The bulk of the paleontological evidence seems, however, to favour 
the Carboniferous age of the Marine series, and it appears that, in spite 
of the survival of some species which in Europe are Lower Carboni- 
ferous, the fauna may be regarded as Uralian and that any later age 
is improbable. 
The stratigraphical evidence appears consistent with this conclusion. 
According to Prof. David, there is a great stratigraphical break just 
above the Upper Marine series, for the two next members 0f the 
sequence, viz. the Middle Coal Measures and Dempsey beds, are often 
absent. Proceeding from the central part of the Carboniferous area, 
these two members disappear southward towards Illawarra, westward 
at Lithgow, and northward along the Macleay River, where the Upper 
Coal Measures also are absent. 
There is accordingly both stratigraphical and paleontological 
evidence that the line between the Upper Marine series and the Middle 
Coal Measures is an important stratigraphical horizon. Of the beds 
above it the most widespread is the Upper Coal Measures; and both its 
flora and fauna mark an important advance upon that of the Lower Coal 
Measures, which are interstratified with the two Marine series. In 
the Upper Coal Measures one of the most significant fossils is the 
Labyrinthodont, Bothriceps, which can hardly be pre-Permian, and 
Huxley indeed assigned it to the Trias. The fossil plants of the Upper 
Coal Measures, Baiera, Schizoneura, Alethopteris, mark the incoming 
of the newer flora, for these genera are absent from the Lower Coal 
Measures of New South Wales. They are Permian and Triassic types. 
Hence I am disposed to regard the upper limit of the Carboniferous in 
New South Wales as at the top of the Upper Marine series, and to 
assign the Middle and Upper Coal Measures to the Permian. 
As regards the other Australian States the question is simpler. In 
Queensland the Bowen River beds, with their Productus brachytherus, 
Glossopteris and Gangamopteris, may be correlated with the Marine 
series of New South Wales, and therefore as Uralian. Above the 
Bowen Coal Measures are the Burrum Coal Measures, and from their 
flora, with Teniopteris Daintreei, they are probably not earlier than 
Rheetic. 
In Victoria some difficulty has been introduced by M‘Coy’s deserip- 
tion of a fossil plant from Bacchus Marsh as T@niopleris Sweeti, as 
on this ground the upper part of the Bacchus Marsh Sandstones have 
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