394 Linnarsson — On the Eophyton Sandstone. 



Beside the seaweeds, Annelid burrows were found in it several years 

 ago, but nothing was known of the existence in it of any other 

 fossils, and it was generally assumed that very few fossils were to 

 be expected in a layer of an age so remote, and that the rock itself 

 was not capable of preserving, in a sufficiently distinct condition, 

 the remains of such organisms as might have been living at the time 

 of its deposition. Accordingly, until late years, very little attention 

 had been directed to the Fucoid sandstone of Vestrogothia, and I. had 

 therefore no great hope of any new discoveries until I succeeded 

 two years ago in finding a Lingula. Some time afterwards Professor 

 Torell published his excellent geognostical and paleeontological de- 

 scription of all the coeval rocks of Sweden,' and of the remarkable 

 discovery made by himself and Dr. J. A. Wallin of a comparatively 

 highly organised plant, the EopMjton LinncBanum, Torell, in these 

 oldest deposits. 



Since, through these important researches of Professor Torell, due 

 attention has been drawn towards the oldest sandstone of Scandinavia, 

 it becomes desirable to know with accuracy its age in relation to de- 

 posits in foreign countries and especially to the English formations, 

 upon which the division into periods of the older Paleozoic time now 

 in use has been founded. At present no certain conclusions can be 

 drawn from the organic remains, these being still so imperfectly 

 known. It is necessary, then, to rely chiefly on the stratification, 

 which can be ascertained with facility and accuracy in Vestrogothia 

 better than anywhere else. Sir E. Murchison, who places the " Prim- 

 ordial zone" in the Lower Silurian system, refers to that system not 

 only'the alum-slate of Vestrogothia, which apparently belongs to the 

 Primordial zone, as defined by Barrande from its Trilobite fauna, 

 but also its sandstone layer.^ Agreeing with Professor Torell,^ I 

 believe, however, the latter to correspond with the " Longmynd 

 group" of England, which is also considered by Sir E. Murchison as 

 Cambrian, and, according to the classification of Sir Charles Lyell, 

 forms the lower part of the Cambrian system of England. Like the 

 Longmynd formation, the sandstone layer of Vestrogothia reposes 

 on gneiss, which we have every reason to believe to be of Lauren- 

 tian age. The alum-slate lying above the sandstone completely 

 corresponds with the Lingula-flags, which in England overlie the 

 Longmynd formation. In the alum-slate of Sweden, as in the 

 Lingula-flags of England, two principal divisions are found, the 

 well characterised faunas of which Professor Angelin was the first 

 to distinguish as the regio Conocorypliarum and regio Olenorum. The 

 older of these regions, the regio Conocorypharum, is characterised 

 chiefly by the genera Paradoxides and Conocoryphe (Conoceplialites) , 

 while the genus Olenus appears later ; thus it is distinctly equivalent 

 to the "Lower Lingula flags" or "Meneevian" group of England. 

 The layers which lie above and below the sandstone layer of Vestro- 

 gothia being thus equivalent to those which bound the Longmynd 



^ Bidrag till Sparagmitetagens geognosi och palffiontologi. Lund, 1868. 



2 Davidson, On the Earliest Forms of BracMopoda, etc., Geol. Mag. 1868. 



3 Russia in Europe and the Ural Mountains, Vol. i. p. 16. 



