﻿Dr. Feistmantel — Bohemian Coal Fauna and Passage-Beds, 1 1 7 



In the mean time I entered into correspondence with Prof. Weiss 

 in Berlin, who classified in a similar manner the Saarbriicken Coal- 

 field, and he communicated to me his opinion that our Niirschan 

 Gas-coal will most probably be analogous to his Otweiler Series, 

 forming the transition from the Carboniferous to the true Permian, 

 which he stated also in an expose in the Zeitschr. d. D. geolog. 

 Gesellsch. 1874, pp. 367-69, referring to my paper "Verb. d. bohm. 

 Kohlen zur Permform. I.e." ; he could not deny the fact, that the 

 Carboniferous and Permian strata appear only as members of one 

 formation, to show which was always my chief intention ; this state- 

 ment of Weiss was therefore a great satisfaction to me. But I yet 

 must recall to mind that Weiss himself gave as characteristic for his 

 Otweiler Series a Carboniferous Flora, without a Permian Fauna, 

 which, however, is so numerous in our Gas-coals at Niirschan (and 

 Eakonitz), that they certainly never can be mistaken for Carbon- 

 iferous. 



In consequence of this I adopted, in a certain way, Herr Weiss's 

 view (in a letter to Dr. Geinitz, in Leonh. und Gein. Jahrb. 1874), 

 considering this Niirschan Gas-coal (therefore the whole upper seam) 

 as passage-beds, which may be called Otweiler Series, in the Saar- 

 briick basin, but strongly advocating the close connexion of this with 

 the Permian formation, and citing the abundance of Xenacanthus, 

 Acanthodes, etc. 



This view I used afterwards again in my general works,^ but only 

 for the Niirschan Gas-coal, considering it parallel with Weiss's 

 Otweiler Series, as passage-beds, while the Kakonitz Gas-coal I 

 jjlaced at the beginning of the Permian. 



1 gave the following table : 



( The true Eed Sandstones, with Permian Fauna and Flora. 

 Permian I Spherosiderites of Zilow and Ledec. 

 ( Rakonitz Gas-coal. 

 ' Above Carboniferous Flora. 

 Otweiler Series S Niirschan Gas-coal, with Permian Fanna and Carbonifei ous Flora. 

 Passage-Beds I Upper seam of the Coal-field at foot of the Eiesengebirge, near 

 I Eadowenz. 



True ) 



^ 1 .J, } Lower Coal-seam district. 



Carboniferous ) 



This was the state of the question, on my part,* when I left for 

 India, engaged on the Geological Survey, after having examined for 

 four years the Bohemian Coal-fields. 



When all the above was written, for the most part with the approval 

 of Mr. Krejci, Professor of Geology, and Dr. Ant. Fritsch, Professor 

 of Zoology and Paleontology in Prague, two visitors, Herr Stur, 



^ Studien im Gebiete des bohm. Kohlengebirges ; Abh. d. k. bohm. Gesellsch. d. 

 Wissenschaften, 1874. Verst. d. bohm. KohlenabL, Cassel, 1874-76. 



2 My paper, " Studien in Kohlengebirge," etc., was later discussed in Nature, 

 July 27, 1876, p. 270, where the reviewer concludes as follows : " But faults like 

 these will not detract from the real value of the work ; when the time comes for a 

 rectification of boundaries on the Permo-Carboniferous frontier, the vast mass of 

 carefully-observed facts which it furnishes will form no unimportant contribution to 

 the body of evidence by which the c^uestion must be decided. The author may have 

 been premature in his conclusions, but his industry and application have produced a 

 work that will have a permanent value." 



