225 



to the superior division of that great class of rocks, and the author 

 asserts that they in no case enter into the Alpine regions, except on 

 the eastern side, viz. in the drainage of the Mur, the Scive, and the 

 Drave, where they occupy ancient longitudinal valleys. 



Haring, described by Messrs. Sedgwick and Murchison as an an- 

 cient estuary, or area of the great tertiary sea of Bavaria, is consi- 

 dered by the author to be a continental, local, freshwater formation. 



The lowest tertiary formations of Austria are, he says, characterized 

 by blue, shelly marl, and marly, shelly molasse (Schlier), which he 

 assimilates to sub-apennine marl.. 



In lower Austria this blue marl is succeeded by sands, marls, lig- 

 nite, and shells, both marine and fluviatile, and these again by gravel 

 and conglomerate, and lastly by nummulite and coralline limestone, 

 alternating with sands and conglomerates, which separate the true 

 tertiary basins of Vienna and Hungary from the deposits of the allu- 

 vial period. 



The oldest alluvial gravel follows many Alpine valleys in the form 

 of terraces, and the same is extended with beds of marl far into the 

 actual valleys of the Danube and the March, and also into the plains 

 of Hungary, where bones of extinct quadrupeds and terrestrial shells 

 are found in it. 



It is in the marl of this old alluvium near Krems that the human 

 skulls have been found, which have been described by Count Breunner. 

 The author remarks on the peculiar form of these skulls, and their 

 resemblance to those of the Caribs and Chilians, &c.; also that he has 

 himself found human skulls in alluvial marl of the same age at Lahr 

 in the valley of the Rhine. 



II. Structure of the south of Bavaria. — The south of Bavaria is 

 chiefly occupied by an extensive tertiary basin, from 1600 to 2000 

 feet above the level of the sea, which is bounded by the primary range 

 of Bohemia and the German Jura on the north, and by the Alpine chain 

 on the south ; whilst it communicates with the tertiary deposits of 

 Vienna and Hungary by the valley of the Danube, and with the 

 molasse of Switzerland on the west. 



The German Jura offers no fissures or transverse valleys by which 

 this basin of Bavaria could have communicated with the Neckar and 

 the Maine ; and at the period of the tertiary deposits this great de- 

 pression must have been equally shut out from all communication 

 with the Mediterranean, by the intervention of the Alpine chain, which 

 the author, differing from M. Von Buch, has in former memoirs de- 

 monstrated to have been elevated at various periods ; an idea which 

 has subsequently been adopted and enlarged upon by M. Elie de 

 Beaumont. 



The German Jura contains also the subdivisions of the oolitic series, 

 from lias up to Stonesfield slate and cornbrash, viz. — 1. Lias with- 

 out the white beds. 2. Lias marl. 3. Lias sandstone. 4. Inferior 

 oolite, with iron ores. 5. Great oolite, mostly compact. 6. Dolo- 

 mitic limestone. 7. Calcareous slate of Solenhofen, with tortoises, 

 fishes, Crustacea, Sepiee, Ammonites, Belemnites, Lepadites, insects, 

 and vegetables. 



