1848.] MURCHISON ON THE STRUCTURE OF THE ALPS. 30/ 



lower greensand, upwards through the gault and upper greensand into 

 the white chalk inclusive, — there also all the species of the genus 

 Nummulina lie invariably above such strata ; and further, that with 

 the exception of one or two forms of Gryphaea and Terebratula (con- 

 ch ifers peculiarly tenacious of life, and which generally occur in the 

 beds of transition above the chalk, and never rise above the lower 

 beds of the nummulitic group), all the fossils associated with the 

 nummulites are of eocene type. I am glad that these conclusions, 

 derived from geological researches and absolute sections, are in har- 

 mony with the results obtained by the most eminent naturalists from 

 their study of organic remains. Brongniart, Deshayes and D'Or- 

 bigny have long maintained that the nummulites of France are truly 

 of tertiary age. Agassiz groups them as rather pertaining to a pe- 

 culiar or lower tertiary. In his recent valuable tabular view of all 

 known fossils (to which I specially invite attention). Professor Bronn 

 of Heidelberg places the nummulitic group as the natural base of all 

 the tertiary deposits. This concordance of physical geology with 

 palaeontology has indeed been everywhere established where patient 

 researches have been carried out. 



In conclusion, it is unnecessary that I should revert to all the de- 

 ductions I have attempted to draw concerning the operations of meta- 

 morphism, contortion, and fracture by which the strata of the Alps 

 and Apennines have been so powerfully affected ; and I will now 

 simply recapitulate the chief points which I have grouped together, 

 in presenting to my countrymen a view of the normal order of the 

 formations, as well as of the derangements they have undergone, in 

 the Alps, Carpathians and Apennines. 



1 . That whilst evidences of Silurian, Devonian and carboniferous 

 rocks exist in the Eastern Alps, the palaeozoic group of Southern 

 Europe nowhere exhibits traces of the Permian system of Northern 

 Europe. 



2. That these palaeozoic rocks are succeeded in the Eastern Alps, 

 and notably in the South Tyrol, by the '* Trias," as characterized by 

 known muschelkalk fossils and also by many species peculiar to the 

 Alpine zone of this system ; whilst none of these fossils have yet been 

 recognized in the Western Alps. 



3. That the Jurassic system of the Alps and Apennines is made up 

 of two distinct calcareous formations ; the inferior representing the 

 lias and lower oolites, the superior the Oxfordian group, so largely 

 developed throughout Russia, though in a very different mineral 

 condition. 



4. That the cretaceous system of Southern Europe is composed of 

 hard subcrystalline Neocomian limestones (the equivalents in great 

 part of the English lower greensand), of a band replete with fossils 

 of the gault and upper greensand, and of red, grey and white lime- 

 stones with Inocerami representing the chalk. 



5. That where the sequence is full and unbroken, the cretaceous 

 rocks of the Alps and Apennines graduate conformably and insensibly 

 upwards by mineral and zoological passages into the nummulitic zone, 



