54 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



None of these three localities has furnished the writer any fossils 

 save a few small crinoid joints in the last mentioned; hence the fossil 

 evidence leaves the question of the correlation of these beds open. 

 The absence of the Sphenophycus latifolius, 

 of fragments of eurypterids and Climacograptus 

 t y p i c a 1 i s would, however, indicate that these beds belong to 

 the Indian Ladder beds which for the greater part are entirely 

 barren. Lithologically they also lack the orange colored rusty thin 

 limestone bands which characterize the lower portion of the Indian 

 Ladder section. It is, however, quite apparent that the New Salem 

 sections do not reach far enough down into the Indian Ladder beds 

 to expose these fossiliferous bands. The beds of the Countryman 

 Hill section correspond to the upper beds of the Indian Ladder 

 section. 



A noteworthy feature of the two sections of the Lower Siluric 

 beds at New Salem is the horizontal change from the prevailing 

 thick sandstone beds of the Countryman Hill section to the dark 

 shales of the other sections in the astonishingly short distance of 

 less than half a mile. 



. Brayman shales 



The status of the Brayman shales has been lucidly brought up to 

 date by Grabau (title 56, page loi). He says: 



These with the exception of the basal sandstones, are the only 

 beds of the Salina period occurring in this region. They have been 

 variously described in the literature as Clinton shales, pyritiferous 

 shales, Salina shales, etc. The name Brayman shales is chosen for 

 them from the village of Braymanville on the Cobleskill, between 

 which place and Howes Cave they are well exposed. As the shales 

 have so far proved unfossiliferous their exact equivalency is some- 

 what uncertain. From their position immediately below the Cobles- 

 kill limestone it may be confidently inferred that they are of Salina 

 age, but whether they represent the Bertie waterlime of Buffalo, 

 which is the immediate predecessor of the Cobleskill of that region, 

 or whether they are of somewhat earlier age is a question difficult 

 to determine. That there is a slight hiatus between the Brayman 

 shales and the Cobleskill seems to be indicated by the fact that the 

 upper bed of these shales is somewhat conglomeratic, with rounded 

 or elongate pebbles of clay shale inclosed in a dark matrix, partly a 

 calcareous sand and containing numerous scattered, rounded quartz 

 grains. This indication of wave activity at the end of deposition of 

 the Brayman shales and the want of transitional beds between the 

 clay shale and the lime sandrock (Cobleskill) suggest that there is a 

 short time interval unrepresented. This fact, together with the 



II 



