LK.sQU£nEus.J PALEONTOLOGY LIGNITIC FLORA AGE. 373 



importaut as characteristic than mollusk, acTrnit tlie formation as Creta- 

 ceous, and consider the plants as without bearing on the question ? I 

 have last year spent some days at Black Butte and in the surrounding 

 country, and may here record the observations which, related to this 

 question, may not find their place elsewhere. 



The Saurian bed, as it is now called, is at the top of the ridge facing 

 the depot, at a short distance, half a mile east from it. The debris 

 taken out in digging the bones of the animal are still mixed with a 

 quantity of fragments of these bones, and some of the specimens are 

 remarkably interesting, bearing as they do, fragments of bones on one 

 side and fossil leaves on the other. The bed is a kind of arenaceous 

 clay, mixed with ashes, and hardened to the consistence of brick by the 

 combustion of the underlying beds of coal. It overlies, east of the 

 station, three alternate ridges of whitish weathered sandstone of the 

 thickness, taken altogether, of 96 feet, being 10 feet 8 inches above the 

 upper ledge, which is a compact, w^hite, hard sandstone, 10 feet thick, 

 and is exposed and can be followed easily to the south for about a 

 quarter of a mile, where the main coal-bed of Black Butte is worked. 

 At this place the section in descending order is : 

 12. Fire-clay and shaly sandstone, 9 feet. 

 11. Yellow sandstone, 6 feet. 

 10. Shale and coal-brash, 1 foot. , 



9. Shaly sandstone and plants, 12 feet. 



8. Coal, 3 to 5 feet. 



7. Fire-clay, 2 to 7 feet. 



6. Main coal, 5 to 7 feet. 



5. Fire-clay, 5 feet. 



4. Clay, capped with slaty sandstone, 5 feet 4 inches. 



3. Coal, 3 feet. 



2. Shale and clay, with oysters, 7 to 10 feet. 



1. White sandstone, 10 feet 8 inches. 

 This sandstone, being the same as the upper sandstone under the 

 Saurian bed, the former section shows the exact horizon where the 

 bones have been found as within or above the lower 3-foot bed of coal 

 Ko. 3, separated by 10 feet of fire-clay from the main Black Butte coal. 

 It is very i)robable that both coal-beds disjointed, at the locality of the 

 Saurian, by a mere clay parting, were destroyed by fire under the stra- 

 tum of clay. Anyhow, I did not find in connection with the bones any 

 species of plants differing specifically from those found in the sandstone 

 Ko. 9 above the upper coal. The specimens represent Sahal, Viburnum clicho- 

 tomum, Ficus planicostata, Myrica Torreyi, Aleurites eocenica, Paliuriis 

 zisyphoides, some stems, Caulinites, and fragments of leaves of a Pla- 

 tanus^ whose middle part only is preserved, and which may be referable 

 to P. Haydenii, the only kind of plant which was not recognized in the 

 shale of the main coal. The case is clear : from all the fossil plants 

 described from Black Butte none is referable to a Cretaceous species ; 

 they are all Tertiary, and force the admission made by Professor Cope 

 in his review {ioc. cit., p. 16) that here a Tertiary flora is contemjioraneous 

 with a Cretaceous fauna. ISTow, this flora is typical for the compounds 

 of the coal-strata, and, of course, the coal-strata are Tertiary. What 

 shall be the name of this formation ; is it Cretaceous on account of the 

 saurian bones, or is it Tertiary on account of the fossil plants in which 

 the skeleton is entombed, and which are found of the same relation all 

 over the Lignitic formations, and at some places, as at Golden, the 

 Eaton, &c., from its base to the upper strata, and which two have 

 entered into the composition of its essential strata, the Lignite? No 

 geologist, I think, will hesitate a moment in pronouncing it, from its 



