1855.] MURCHISON AND MORRIS — THE HARZ. 435 



stone on the grassy flank of the Patter Berg, and which, having no 

 visible relation to the altered grauwacke or eruptive rocks of the 

 mountain on the south, is at once succeeded on the north by mural 

 and more or less vertical Zechstein with gypsum, followed by Mus- 

 chelkalk and other secondary formations up to the Chalk inclusive. 

 Debarred therefore from pronouncing any opinion respecting the 

 relations of the protruding bosses of the older limestone, we have 

 merely to report upon their chief fossils, as extracted by the assiduous 

 labours of M. Jasche, for in our brief inspection we could observe 

 no organic remains in the rocks in situ. 



Among the fossils collected by M. Jasche *, we saw several which 

 would unquestionably induce us to view them as Silurian ; such as a 

 Pentamerus, not distant from P. Knightii, and very much resembling 

 P. Vogulicus of the Ural Mountains ; Orthis antiquata, and two or 

 three others of that genus, one of which is near to O. expansa, 

 another to O. elegantula ; Chonetes {LeptcEnd) lata (the small form), 

 L. depressa; Orhicula rugata, O. Forbesiil (Davidson); Lingula 

 minima ; Cornulites, &c. There are also forms of Terehratula^ 

 such as T. princeps, Barr., and T. melonia^ Barr., which mark the 

 uppermost Silurian of Bohemia, and are also undoubted Devonian 

 types. There are here other forms which unquestionably have more 

 of a Devonian than a Silurian character. Such were the Phacops and 

 the AmplexiLS ; and to these must be added the Terebratula prin- 

 cepSy to which M. de Verneuil (who has seen the collection since 

 we inspected it) attaches great weight as a good Devonian type. 

 Another spot whence M. Jasche has procured many fossils is called 

 Tannenberg, and these have a more Silurian character than those 

 of Klosterholz, including Cardiola interrupta^ with many Lamelli- 

 branchiate shells {Gram^nysicE, CypricardicB^ &c.), SindOrthoceratites 

 both large and small. 



It is highly probable, therefore, that if all the older palaeozoic 

 strata which were originally deposited in this neighbourhood could 

 be detected amidst the dislocated chaotic piles resulting from the 

 eruptions of the granitic and other igneous rocks of the chain, we 

 should meet with links which connect the uppermost Silurian with 

 the true and well-known fossiliferous base of the Devonian, or the 

 ** broad- winged Spirifer strata" of the Rhine. Already, indeed, the 

 rock of Klosterholz exhibits an approach to that deposit in the 

 several species of Spirifer which occur in it, though none of these 

 are known Devonian forms ; still less has the Pleurodictyum pro- 

 blematicum, or any of the types common in the lowest Devonian rocks 

 of the adjacent Rammelsberg near Goslar, been found near Usenburg. 

 Until better evidences be produced, we would therefore also class 

 these rocks as Upper Silurian, and consider them as a link higher in 

 the series than the limestone of Mjigdesprung. 



In a memoir recently published f, M. Carl Prediger has, indeed, 



* In the * Palaeontographica,' vol. v. part 1, 1855, are detailed descriptions and 

 figures of the fossils from these localities by Adolf Roemer, forming a portion of 

 the 3rd part of his " Geology of the North-western Harz." 



t Zeitschrift fUr die gesammten Naturwissenschaften, Halle, June 1854, p. 34. 



