86 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



Chapter j 

 STRATIGRAPHY OF THE NIAGARA REGION 



The stratigraphy of the Niagara region, or the succession of fos- 

 siHferous beds, their origin, characteristics and fossil contents, has 

 since the time of Hall's investigations barely received cursory 

 attention from American geologists, whose interest has chiefly 

 centered in the problem of the physical development of the 

 gorge and cataract. A careful examination of the strata 

 of this region and of their fossils reveals problems as in- 

 teresting and profound as those furnished by the gorge 

 and cataract, and many of them are of far more funda- 

 mental and far-reaching significance. Profoundly interesting and 

 instructive as is the " Story of Niagara " and of the physical develop- 

 ment of the present surface features, it becomes insignificant when 

 placed by the side of that great history of the rise, development and 

 decline of vast mlutitudes of organic beings which inhabited the 

 ancient seas of this region and whose former existence is scarcely 

 dreamt of by the average visitor to the falls. These ancient hosts 

 left their remains embedded in the rocks of this region; and from 

 the record thus preserved the careful student is able to read at least 

 in outline the successive events in the great drama which was 

 enacted here, in an antiquity so remote that it baffles the imagination 

 which would grasp it. But he who would decipher these records 

 must bear in mind the maxim of La Rochefoucauld: ''Pour bien 

 saz'oir iinc chose, il fatit en saz'oir les details. ^^ A knowledge of de- 

 tails is necessary to an understanding of the stratigraphic and 

 paleontologic history of this region, and there is no better way of 

 obtaining this knowledge than by a close study of the various sec- 

 tions which expose the strata here described. 



The strata of the Niagara region belong to the Siluric series of 

 deposits, which accumulated during the Siluric era of the earth's 

 history.^ Rocks of Devonic age occupy the southern portion of 

 the district, resting on and concealing the Siluric strata which dip 

 beneath them. {See fig. i, p. 19) As has already been noted, all 



^See table in chapter 2. 



