FOSSIL CORALS FROM CENTRAL AMERICA, CUBA, AND 

 PORTO RICO, WITH AN ACCOUNT OF THE AMERICAN 

 TERTIARY, PLEISTOCENE, AND RECENT CORAL REEFS. 



By Thomas Wayland Vatjghan, 



Custodian of Madreporaria, United States National Museum, and Geologist in charge 

 of Coastal Plain Investigations, United States Geological Survey. 



INTRODUCTION. 



The object of the present memoir is to contribute information 

 that may aid in deciphering the geologic history of the perimeters 

 of the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea. Therefore, problems 

 of correlation, the physical conditions under which the different 

 formations were deposited, and the distribution of land and sea 

 during the successive geologic epochs have been particularly in mind. 



The material on which this paper is based is extensive. It 

 includes collections made in Panama by Dr. D. F. MacDonald and 

 me, working jointly, and by Doctor MacDonald while alone; and Dr. 

 Ralph Arnold obtained a small but valuable lot of specimens at 

 Empire in the Canal Zone. The collections from Cuba were made 

 by Dr. Arthur C. Spencer, Mr. 0. E. Meinzer, and myself; the one 

 from Porto Rico was made by Mr. R. T. Hill, who also obtained a 

 small but valuable lot of specimens in Antigua; the principal col- 

 lections from Antigua and Anguilla are the results of my individual 

 efforts, and I obtained considerable material in St. Bartholomew, 

 but not so much as Cleve got in 1869. There are numbers of small 

 lots, as follows: One from Nicaragua, obtained by Dr. C. W. Hayes; 

 one from Colombia, collected by Mr. G. C. Matson; specimens from 

 Limon, Costa Rica, procured by Doctor Wailes and Mr. H. Pittier; 

 and specimens from eastern Mexico, obtained by Mr. E. T. Dumble. 

 All of the collections mentioned are the property of the United 

 States National Museum, having been made in connection with 

 official work of some kind, or the material, if privately collected, 

 has been presented to the Museum. Messrs. Matson, Wailes, Pittier, 

 and Dumble have presented specimens. My own collecting in 

 Antigua, St. Bartholomew, and Anguilla was made possible by a 

 minor grant from the Carnegie Institution of Washington, and as a 

 result I brought some thousands of specimens to Washington. 



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