PARALLELISM OF THE QUEBEC GROUP. 33 



No. 4 of this group is primordial, but No. 5, the St. Albans' 

 group, is very obscurely, or not sufficiently defined, to enable us to 

 recognize it. No. 3 consists of a large tract of stratified limestone 

 ten miles in length, and (opposite Phillipsburgh) two miles wide. 

 The strata, in general, dip easterly at an angle of from 12° to 25°, 

 but in many places the dip is much steeper and in a different di- 

 rection. It is not an accumulation of lenticular masses, as Mr. 

 Marcou calls it, but a large tract of regularly stratified limestone. 

 Its thickness, measured across the outcropping edges of the strata, 

 is about 1500 feet. It holds numerous fossils, mostly identical 

 with those of the Point Levis limestones. The slates called by Mr. 

 Marcou Swanton slates., and placed, in his section, above the lime- 

 stones and below the Potsdam, are, in great part, destitute 

 of fossils. A few graptolites have been found in them by the Rev. 

 Mr. Perry, Dr. Hall (both of Swanton), and myself. They are 

 thus, according to palaeontology, not primordial slates. Here 

 then, as at Quebec, palaeontology affords Mr. Marcou no assistance, 

 but strong opposition instead. Physical geology does not aid him 

 in placing the Potsdam above the slates because neither at Phillips- 

 burgh nor at Swanton is there any of the Potsdam within a mile 

 of them. How then does he know which of the two formations 

 is uppermost! The only place where these slates can be seen in 

 this neighbourhood, in contact with any other formation, is at the 

 village of Phillipsburgh, and here they underlie the limestones. 

 They form the lower thirty feet of the cliff along the water's edge, 

 commencing at Strite's Hotel. Yet Mr. Marcou places them above 

 the limestones. If he is right, then there must be a great disloca- 

 tion here. 



Mr. Marcou says, that last year, he remained only a few hours at 

 Phillipsburgh and that he adopted, without examination, the opi- 

 nions expressed by me in my paper on the age of the Phillipsburgh 

 limestones, referring them to the Calciferous and Chazy. " But, 

 he says, " a careful survey this year has convinced me that at 

 Philipsburgh, as well as at poiut Levis, Mr. Billings has been mis- 

 led in giving explanations, and arriving at conclusions, in his pal- 

 seontological researches, which are entirely at variance with what 

 exists in nature." In answer to this I shall only say that I studied 

 the natural facts that were laid before me, i. e., the fossils, accord- 

 ing to the principles established by the great masters of palaeon- 

 tology, such as Cuvier, Barrande, Agassiz, and others ; and I do 

 not fear for the result. If he had done the same he never would 

 Can. Nat. 3 Vol. VIII. 



