296 Canadian Record of Science. 



On a New or hitherto Unrecogistized Geological 



Formation in the Devonian 



System of Canada. 



By H. M. Ami, 

 of the Geological Survey of Canada. 



The paper describes an outcrop of what appears to be 

 the base of the Old Eed Sandstone of Britain and that 

 phase of it, sucli as occurs in tlie red Cornstone of 

 Herefordshire, England. It is met with in the red shales 

 and sandstones of McArras Brook in Antigonish County, 

 Nova Scotia, from which a most interesting and important 

 fish fauna has recently been obtained, referable to a Lower 

 Devonian horizon. 



The presence of Pteraspidians, Cephalaspidians and 

 Acanthodians, as well as Pterygotus, as deternnned by 

 Mr. A. Smith Woodward and Dr. Henry Woodward, London, 

 would seem to indicate clearly the presence of a fauna 

 precisely similar in parts to the Hereford beds referable to 

 the Lower Devonian or Old Eed Sandstone. 



The Pteraspis found in a calcareous matrix in the series 

 of strata is one which Mr. Woodward refers to as very 

 closely allied if not actually identical with P. CroucMi. 



The horizon indicated is low down in the Devonian, not 

 far from the summit of the Silurian. From the nature of 

 the sediments, their composition, origin and general char- 

 acters, they appear to be much more closely related to 

 European Devonian or Old Eed Sandstone strata than to 

 the usual type of ISTorth American Devonian such as is 

 met with in the Peninsula of Gaspe, or in Ontario and 

 Manitoba and the United States. 



The term Knoydart formation is assigned to this series 

 of strata in order to be able to designate and separate it 

 from other paheozoic formations in that portion of Eastern 



