1848.] MURCHISON ON THE STRUCTURE OF THE ALPS. 215 



been described elsewhere, and particularly at Sonthofen. In refer- 

 ring my readers to page 338 of the third volume of the Transactions 

 of the Geological Society, I have only to request them to consider the 

 great group of the flysch, nos. 2, 3 and 4 (Miesenbach to Loheim), 

 as overlying the nummulitic strata nos. 5, 6 and 7, and the whole falls 

 into order with Sonthofen and the Swiss types. To make that in- 

 structive section entirely coincide with my present views, I ought to 

 add, that between the northern end of the nummulitic grits and the 

 setting on of the tertiary molasse, the grand fault so often alluded 

 to occurs, and is represented by piles of detritus. The truth is, 

 that the great external fault of the Alps here, as in all the other 

 places cited, inverting the flysch and throwing it oif to the south, 

 brings up, against strata of pliocene age, the very oldest or bottom 

 beds of the eocene deposit. 



This great fault has, however, been moderate in its operation in 

 Austria and on the south slopes of the valley of the Danube, when 

 compared with the gigantic dislocations that accompany it in Bavaria 

 (Griinten), and in Switzerland (Holier Sentis and Pilatus, &c.), where 

 even the neocomian limestone, or the equivalent of the very bottom 

 of our lower greensand, is thrust up into lofty escarpments, on the 

 upper surfaces of which the overlying cretaceous and nummulitic 

 groups are pitched in towards the Alps, whilst that neocomian or the 

 oldest formation of the whole succession is at once in contact with 

 younger tertiary nagelflue ! Thus, whether we appeal to the Austrian, 

 Bavarian or Swiss sections, we perceive (now that we have a true ac- 

 quaintance with ^^ed. fossiliferous base-lines), that there is an ascend- 

 ing order from the point of junction with the younger tertiary, or in 

 other words, that in the valley of the Danube, as in the great valley 

 of Switzerland, or on the shores of the lake of Constance, the under- 

 lying members of the series on which in other places the nummulitic 

 group rests, rise up at the very outside of everything alpine, and 

 often throw oif the younger portion of the eocene formations into 

 the abnormal position of dipping under the great secondary limestones 

 of the chain. 



In regard to the cretaceous group of Gosau, it has been already 

 remarked that it is deficient, both in not possessing any solid lime- 

 stone with fossils to represent, as in Switzerland and Bavaria, the 

 true equivalent of the white chalk, and also in being void of a distinct 

 nummulitic zone. I have, however, now little doubt, that the sand- 

 stone, impure limestone and shale, which there overlie the marls, re- 

 cognised by their fossils to be cretaceous, are representatives in time 

 of a portion of the nummulitic and flysch series of other parts. In 

 fact, it may be said of Gosau, that the lithological type of the " flysch" 

 there descends not only to the horizon of the inoceramus limestone, 

 to the total exclusion of any limestone to represent the chalk, but 

 also takes possession of nearly all the series of beds which further 

 represent the upper greensand and gault ; the first bands of hard and 

 coherent rock being the subcrystalline hippurite limestone, which, 

 like that of the Untersberg, near Salzburg, represents the neocomian 

 formation. 



