224 PEOCEEDINGS OF IHB GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. [Feb. 8, 



Haute-Mame.; Still later M. Lory showed that the relations 

 between the Mhodanien and the Urgonien were quite as close as 

 those between the former and the Aptien. As we thus appear to 

 have in the Rliodanien a complete link between the Upper and 

 Middle Neocomian, the boundary between these divisions becomes a 

 perfectly arbitrary one, and great diversity of opinion exists among 

 geologists to which of them certain deposits should be assigned. 

 Among those strata which lie upon the debatable confines of the 

 Upper and Middle Neocomian, we must class the Punfield Forma- 

 tion. But though there may be diversity of opinion as to the arti- 

 ficial scheme of classification best adapted for grouping these strata, 

 their true relative position in the Keocomian series is on palseon- 

 tological evidence perfectly clear. Ammonites Deshayesii, which 

 occurs in the Marine Band of Punfield, is a very widely distributed 

 species and has a restricted and well-defined vertical range, abound- 

 ing in the higher portions of the Neocomian, but being unknown 

 in the Urgonien or any lower bed. Vicarya Lujani and several 

 other of the Punfield shells are well-known and characteristic JRho- 

 danien forms. All the palaeontological evidence points to the con- 

 fines of the Upper and Middle Neocomian as the true place of the 

 Punfield formation ; and it will, I think, be in accordance with the 

 views of a majority of the geologists of authority on this subject to 

 regard the " Perna-beds " as the base of the Upper Neocomian, and 

 the Punfield beds as the highest part of the Middle Neocomian. 



2. Coal-hearing Strata of Eastern Spain. — It is, however, in the 

 Spanish peninsula that we find the closest analogues of the Punfield 

 Formation. These beds have, during the last twenty years, been 

 made known to us by the admirable researches of MM. Vilanova, 

 de Verneuil, CoUomb, de Loriere, and Coquand. As no description 

 of these beds has yet appeared in this country, it may be of interest 

 to notice briefly their chief features in this place. The recently 

 published very valuable memoir of M. Coquand enables us to do this 

 the more readily*. 



The principal exposures of the deposits in question are situated 

 on the confines of the ancient kingdoms of Arragon and Valencia, in 

 the provinces of Teruel and Castellon de la Plana, though less im- 

 portant and outlying masses of the same strata occur in the valley 

 of the Guadalupe and in Catalonia, near the mouth of the Ebro. 



In the province of Teruel, where they form three important pro- 

 ductive coal-basins, those of Utrillas, Gargallo, and of the Val 

 d'Arifio, the strata, which are more than 1600 feet thick, are 

 divisible into three series, which, however, pass into one another 



* De Verneuil et Collomb. Bull. Soc.G^ol. de France, 2^ ser. tome x. (1853). 



Vilanova, Memoria Geognostica (1859). 



H. Coquand. Mem. de I'^tage Aptien de I'Espagne (1865). 



De Verneuil et De Loriere. Fossiles d'Utrillas (1868). 



De Verneuil et Collomb. Carte geologique de I'Espagne et du Portugal 

 (Paris 1864). 



H. Coquand. Description geologique de la formation cretac^e de la pro- 

 vince de Teruel. Bull. Soc. G6ol. de France, 2me s6r. tome xxir. p. 144 

 (1868). 



