8 GEOLOGICAL MEMOIRS. 



while above this point, between Bazias and Pesth, interruptions are 

 often met with. The bed of the Danube may be regarded as a curved 

 line marking the direction of a fault, the plan of which is somewhat 

 inclined, and on which a movement of upheaval has taken place on 

 the right bank, and of subsidence on the left ; while the Danube 

 itself occupies the depression thus caused. This statement is based 

 upon the fact, that wherever any trace of a formerly higher level of 

 the present river-system is found, it is always upon the right bank, 

 without any corresponding elevation on the left. The author refers 

 here especially to Csernavoda and other localities enumerated on p. 2. 

 The relation of the History of Man to the Pleistocene Period. — From 

 the fact that in Pleistocene deposits, as well as in bone-caverns, in 

 Hungary and the South of Russia no human remains have hitherto 

 been found ; and as the relics of human industry date also from a 

 later period, the author infers that during the flint-period, and even 

 the subsequent stone -period, this part of Europe was not inhabited, 

 but that it became peopled during the bronze-period, and that its 

 first inhabitants witnessed the draining of the great freshwater lakes. 

 From written history we may only infer that since the time of 

 Trajan no considerable change has taken place respecting the levels 

 of the two banks of the Danube and its affluents ; but changes that 

 might have taken place previous to this date would not have been 

 recorded. Nevertheless, the recollection of the tradition of such an 

 event as the draining of a great lake going on successively before the 

 eyes of several generations remained for a long time deeply impressed 

 upon the minds of the inhabitants of the district, and is not yet 

 totally effaced — the view still prevailing among the inhabitants of 

 Hungary being " that these plains were once covered by a freshwater 

 sea (mare dulce), the water of which afterwards found its way 

 through the ' narrows ' of the Iron-gate." [J. S.] 



On the Upper Nummulitic Strata of Hungary. 

 By Dr. Zittel. 



[Proceed. Imp. Acad. Vienna, October 9, 1862.] 



According to the observations of Prof. Peters, these strata rest on 

 the great wide-spread Nummulitic Limestone. Palaeontologically 

 they are equivalent to the strata of Ronca, forming, with other coeval 

 beds, a distinct geological horizon, generally known as the Upper 

 Niunmulitic formation. Among 68 species of organic remains 

 occurring in this formation in Hungary, 19 are new ; 23 are met 

 with at Ronca and in the Yicentin ; 22 in the Calcaire grossier of 

 Paris ; only 4 in Oligocene deposits : and of these last, 3 species 

 have also been found in decidedly Eocene beds. 



Dr. Zittel hence infers that the freshwater and marine deposits 

 around Gran, including some coal-seams, together with the fossilife- 

 rous sands near Stuhlweissenburg, belong to the Upper Nummulitic 

 formation, and are far more nearly allied to the deposits of the 

 Eocene than to those of the Oligocene periods. [Count M.] 



