124 c - H - GORDON 



destitute of both plants and vertebrates, though abounding in the 

 remains of invertebrates. The Pennsylvanian aspect of this fauna 

 has strongly impressed some investigators, including the author 

 of this paper, and doubt was entertained as to whether the plane 

 of separation between the Pennsylvanian and the Permian should be 

 drawn at the base or at the top of the formation. The studies of 

 David White, Beede, and others have contributed much in recent 

 years to a knowledge of the Permian in American and in the main 

 support the view of the Permian age of the Wichita formation. 

 In a recent paper Beede 1 has ably discussed the Permian of Kansas, 

 with which he correlates the "Red Beds" of Texas. Cummins 

 correlates the beds of eastern Baylor County which he regards 

 as the top of the Wichita formation with the Fort Riley limestone 

 of the Chase group of Kansas. "It is quite certain that the Fort 

 Riley horizon is the same as the Wichita of Texas and is at the very 

 top of the division." 2 The top boundary of the Wichita formation 

 was drawn by Cummins 3 at the top of a stratum of red clay over- 

 lain by thin beds of limestone and blue shales at a point on the Big 

 Wichita four miles west of the east boundary of Baylor County. 

 However, as we have shown, beds which are undoubtedly the same 

 as those which appear at Seymour and southward in Throckmorton 

 County appear in the banks of the Big Wichita River some eight 

 to ten miles west of this point. The thickness of the strata included 

 here, which overlie Cummins' topmost beds, and are here included 

 with them in the Wichita formation, is estimated to be 250 to 300 

 feet. The whole limestone and shale series of Baylor County, 

 thus included as the upper division of the Wichita formation, is 

 provisionally placed at 450 to 500 feet, and consists, as shown 

 elsewhere, of limestone beds of varying thicknesses separated by 

 varying but usually great thicknesses of shale. 



How much of this is to be correlated with the Fort Riley lime- 

 stones can be determined only by more detailed stratigraphic and 

 paleontologic studies. Cummins evidently intended to include 



1 J. N. Beede, Journal of Geology, XVII (1909), 710-29; Kansas University 

 Science Bulletin, IV, No. 3 (1907). 



2 W. F. Cummins, Transactions of the Texas Academy of Science, II (1897), 98. 



3 Second Annual Report, Texas Geological Survey (1891), 402, 403; also Fourth 

 Annual Report (1893), 224. 



