1853.] RIBEIRO AND SHARPE BUSSACO. 135 



2. 071 the Carboniferous and Silurian Formations of the 

 neighbourhood of Bussaco in Portugal. By Senhor Carlos 

 RiBEiRO. With Notes and a Description of the Animal Remains, 

 by Daniel Sharpe, Esq., F.G.S.*, J. W. Salter, Esq., F.G.S., 

 and T. Rupert Jones, Esq., F.G.S. : and an Account of the 

 Vegetable Remains, by Charles J. F. Bunbury, Esq., For. 

 Sec. Geol. Soc. 



Plates VII. VIII. IX. 



The Palaeozoic deposits of Bussaco are bounded on the west by newer 

 deposits, which have been partly described by Mr. Sharpe : before 

 entering upon the principal subject of this memoir some remarks are 

 added which serve to connect his observations with those which follow 

 here. 



Jurassic Series. — In the Val de GorgoraOj half a mile north of 

 Coimbra, is a limestone with many species of shells, the same as those 

 of Mealhada, which probably belongs to the Inferior Oolitef . This 

 rests on the limestone of Montarroio in Coimbra, in which were found 

 the carapace of a Turtle and many shells absolutely different from 

 those of the Jurassic rocks of this district ; but it contains neither 

 Ammonites nor Belemnites. The shells have some analogy to those 

 found at Chao de Lamas and Cinco Villas, ten and eighteen miles 

 south of Coimbra, which will be mentioned presently, one of which 

 resembles Posidonia minuta, while others are probably Mytili. 



Immediately below the above and resting conformably on the Red 

 Sandstone, with which it contrasts strongly in colour and mineral 

 characters, is a group of beds not exceeding five metres in thickness 

 and of limited extent, observed at Lordomao, one mile north-east of 

 Coimbra, in the Quinta di Varzea, and at Pereiros on the side of the 

 road to Thomar, three miles south of Coimbra : the lowest beds are 

 of a coarse grey sandstone, covered by a series of thin beds of fine 

 calcareous sandstone of a dark yellow colour, alternating with yellow 

 marl and grey and black shales ; some of these beds are covered with 

 very imperfect casts of shells of very few species. 



* In November 1850 Senhor Ribeiro sent me an account of some beds through 

 which he was engaged in sinking a shaft in search of coal at Santa Christina, ten 

 or twelve miles north of Coimbra, on the west side of the Serra de Bussaco. The 

 letter contained so much interesting geological information that I requested him 

 to add such further details as he possessed, which I offered to lay before our So- 

 ciety. Senhor Ribeiro complied with my request most obligingly, and sent me 

 also a rich collection of organic remains illustrative of his notes. To avoid the 

 repetitions inevitable in correspondence, I have condensed the substance of his 

 letters into a connected memoir, to which I have added lists and descriptions of 

 part of the Organic Remains, and to which Mr. Bunbury has liindly added an ac- 

 count of the Fossil Plants, Mr. Salter an account of the Trilobites, and Mr. Jones 

 of the Entomostraca. Senhor Ribeiro had before him my paper on the Secondary 

 Rocks of Portugal (Journ. Geol. Soc. vol. vi. p. 135) and has carefully filled up 

 several gaps left in it, but the principal part of his paper relates to a district which 

 I did not reach. — D. S. 



t I referred the Limestone of Mealhada to the Lias on the evidence of an abun- 

 dance of Belemnites paxillosus, loc. cit. p. 163. From Casal Combro, near Meal- 

 hada, Senhor Ribeii'o has sent me Belemnites clavatus, Blainv., a Lias species, 

 and Lucina lirata, Phillips, of the Inferior Oolite and Lias. — D. S. 



