358 Coal Formation of Nova Scotia. 
phalus levis, Pileopsis vetustus? Pecten plicatus, Isocardia unio- 
niformis, Producta Martini, P. Scotica? Terebratula elongata, 
Fenestella membranacea ? Ceriopora spongites, Goldf. For assist- 
ance in determining these the author has been chiefly indebted 
to M. De Verneuil. 
The plants associated with these limestones consist of several 
species of Lepidodendron, Calamites, and others agreeing with 
carboniferous forms. With these Mr. Lyell found in Horton 
Bluff scales of a Ganoid fish, and in the ripple-marked sandstones 
of the same place Mr. Logan discovered footsteps which appear 
to Mr. Owen to belong to some unknown species of reptile, con- 
stituting the first indications of the reptilian class known in the 
carboniferous rocks. Several of the shells and corals of this 
group have been recognized by Messrs. Murchison and De Ver- 
neuil as identical with fossils of the gypsiferous deposit of Perm 
in Russia, and it had been successively proposed, (see Proceedings 
of the Geological Society, Vol. III, p. 712, and Mr. Murchison’s 
Anniversary Address, Feb. 1843, Vol. IV, p. 125,) to refer these 
gypsiferous beds of Nova Scotia to the Trias, and to the period 
of the magnesian limestone. ‘That they are more ancient than 
both these formations Mr. Lyell infers, not only from their fossils, 
but also from their occupying a lower position than the produc- 
tive coal-measures of Nova Scotia and Cape Breton. In proof of 
this inferiority of position three sections are referred to; first, that 
of the coast of Cumberland, near Minudie, where beds of red sand- 
stone, gypsum and limestone are seen dipping southwards, or in 
a direction which would carry them under the productive coal- 
measures of the South Joggins, which attain a thickness of sev- 
eral miles. Secondly, the section on the East River of Pictou, 
where the productive coal-measures of the Albion mines repose 
on a formation of red sandstone including beds of limestone, in 
which Mr. J. Dawson and the author found Producta Martini and 
other fossils common to the gypsiferous rocks of Windsor, &c. 
Some of these limestones are oolitic like those of Windsor, and 
gypsum occurs near the East River, fourteen miles south of Pic- 
tou, so situated as to lead to the presumption that it is an integral 
part of the inferior red sandstone group. ‘Thirdly, in Cape Breton 
according to information supplied by Mr. Richard Brown, the 
gypsiferous formation occupies a considerable tract, consisting of 
red marl with gypsum and limestone. In specimens of the lat- 
