CA RB ONIFER O US A ND PERM I A N FORMA TIONS 3 



disproved by Meek, who criticised Professor Marcou's corre- 

 lation in the following words : " but upon what evidence he 

 [Professor Marcou] does not say, nor is it apparent to anyone 

 who regards fossils as any guide in identifying rocks, as those 

 found here consist of the same forms constituting the group so 

 often mentioned as characterizing the Coal Measures of the 

 Western States."' 



Meek regarded the exposures along the Missouri River in 

 Nemaha county as geologically above the Nebraska City beds, 

 for he said : "At Nebraska City, and below there, at Otoe City, 

 Brownville, and Aspinwall, there are, perhaps, altogether, near 

 150 to 200 feet of additional strata, all holding probably a posi- 

 tion above the geological horizon of the top of the boring at 

 Nebraska City."^ On the contrary, Dr. Hayden regarded the 

 Aspinwall section as somewhat older than that at Nebraska 

 City, for he said: "The rocks at Aspinwall are all geologically 

 at a little lower horizon than the Nebraska City beds, and mostly 

 beneath the Brownville beds." 3 In the Aspinwall section Meek 

 reported a stratum of coal one foot ten inches in thickness, 

 eighteen feet above low water of the Missouri River and another 

 six-inch stratum eleven and one-half feet higher. No oppor- 

 tunity was afforded me to study this section, hence I am unable 

 to state whether the coal lies at the base of the Wabaunsee 

 formation or not ; but all the rocks of this county exhibited 

 along the bluffs of the Missouri River belong to that geologic 

 series usually termed the Upper Coal Measures, for which Dr. 

 Keyes has proposed the very appropriate name of Missourian.'' 



'Fin. Rep. U. S. Geol. Sur. Nebraska, etc., p. 114. 

 "Ibid., p. 137 ; also see p. 123, where a similar statement occurs. 

 3 Ibid., p. 17. 



•• Am. Geol., Vol. XVIII, Jul}'' 1896, p. 25 ; also see Iowa Geol. Surv., Vol. 1, 1893, 

 p. 85. The writer would suggest the following classification for the Upper Coal 

 Measures of the Western Interior province : 



Cottonwood formation (Prosser) 

 Missourian series (Keyes), - - - -j Wabaunsee " " 



The formations below the Wabaunsee have been recently studied by Drs. Keyes and 

 Haworth, to whom the writer leaves the selection of names for the lower part of the 

 series. 



