Reviews 



SUMMARIES OF CURRENT NORTH AMERICAN PRE-CAM- 

 BRIAN LITERATURE.' 



Walcott^ reports on the results of an examination of Cambrian 

 and pre-Cambrian formations on Smith's Sound, Newfoundland, during 

 the summer of 1899. At Smith point he found the Olenellus fauna 

 369 feet below the summit of the Etcheminian, and one of its types, 

 Coleoloides typicalis, in the basal bed of the Cambrian, on the south 

 side of Random Island. This retains the Etcheminian of Newfound- 

 land in the Lower Cambrian. 



The Random terrane, so-called from a typical section on Random 

 Sound, is a series of sandstones, quartzitic sandstones, and sandy shales, 

 resting conformably upon the Signal Hill conglomerate (which was 

 formerly supposed to represent the top of the Avalon or Algonkian 

 series) and extending up to the base of the Cambrian. The Random 

 terrane is thus the upper member of the Avalon series and fills a por- 

 tion, if not all, of the gap between the Signal Hill conglomerate and 

 the Cambrian. The Cambrian rests on the Random terrane with a 

 thin belt of conglomerate. The thickness of the terrane is probably 

 1000 feet. In one horizon in the terrane were found several varieties 

 of annelid trails, including a variety about 5 millimeters broad, a 

 slender form J^ millimeter broad, and an annulated trail 2 to 3 milli- 

 meters in width. 



An examination of the form known as Aspidella terranovica found 

 in the Momable terrane of the Avalon series proved the supposed 

 fossil to be a spherulitic concretion, and this removes it from among 

 the possible pre-Cambrian forms of life. 



Cushing^ describes and maps the pre-Cambrian rocks of Franklin 



'Continued from p. 87, Vol. IX, this Journal. 



^Random, A Pre-Cambrian Upper Algonkian Terrane, by Charles D. 

 Walcott : Bulletin of the Geological Society of America, Vol. XI, 1900, pp. 3-5. 



3 Preliminary Report on the geology of Franklin county, Pt. Ill, by H. P. 

 Gushing : Eighteenth Annual Report of the State Geologist of the State of New 

 York, 1900, pp. 75-128. With geological map. 



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