. 





222 



PERMIAN FOSSILS. 



[Ch. XL 



Austrian Alps affords evidence, by the large size of its am- 

 monites, orthocerata, and other shells, that in the east of 



climate 



e 



mentioned 



swarming on the land and in the rivers and estuaries. This 

 St. Cassian fauna is known to extend as far north as lat. 55° 

 and has been traced as far south in India as the Himalaya 

 mountains in lat. 30°, showing that the elevated temperature 

 alluded to was of wide geographical extent. 



Triassic conglomerate. 

 rock in the New Red 



some 



in Devonshire, has led Mr. Godwin-Austen to refer their 

 transport to ice-action ; but this opinion has been contro- 

 verted by Mr. Pengelly,"* who has shown that such masses 



mi 



moved by breakers beating against a wasting cliff. 



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mian 



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of which the records are wanting, in that part of the globe 

 as yet best known to the geologist. It constitutes the line of 

 division between the primary and secondary, or between the 

 Paleozoic and Mesozoic formations. The Permian rocks 

 have been traced as far north as Petschora-land in Eussia 

 between lat. 65° and 70° N. They occur largely in Germany 

 and England ; and in North America have been traced as far 

 south as Kansas and Nebraska, lat. 44° N. 



Amongst the Permian shells we find the genera Nautilus 

 and Orthoceras, and these are sometimes accompanied by 

 large reptiles of a family called Thecodonts, which combine 

 in their structure many characters of the living crocodiles 

 and lacertians. They are most nearly allied to the Varanian 

 Monitors, which now inhabit tropical countries. The fossil 

 plants of the Permian formation are very like those of the 

 antecedent carboniferous strata, of which I shall presently 

 speak, and indicate the prevalence of a warm and moist 

 climate throughout a great part of the northern hemisphere. 



Supposed signs of ice-action in the Permian Period. — Pro- 

 fessor Ramsay, in an able memoir published in 1855, gave 



* See his Paper on the Red Sandstone Conglomerates of Devonshire, part n. 











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