196 LEA'S DESCRIPTION OF A FOSSIL SAURIAN 



Permian Fossils." This is the second (b) of his six divisions of the Permian rocks,, 

 beginning at the top, and is included in the Zechstein of German geologists. He 

 considers that the Permian rocks were deposited during the latest division of the 

 Protozoic or primary organic period. Those of the Triassic in the earliest division 

 of the Deuterozoic period. " The separation is based on the idea that organic nature 

 undervi'ent a marked change at the time the Permian rocks were being deposited. 

 This idea invests the fossil remains of this rock with the utmost importance in 

 philosophical geology." 



He gives a very full account of the organic remains of the Permian system, and in 

 his views in regard to its relations with the formations above and below it, he does 

 not seem to be so decisive as to a well determined separation from the Trias, as most 

 geologists of England at the present time. At the same time, he finds a stronger 

 relation to the carboniferous series than to the Trias. In regard to the plants, he 

 says, " doubtless a few large groups, and several genera appeared for the first time 

 during the early part of this period ; but there is nothing to indicate any great 

 phytological break between the two widely separated systems — the Carboniferous and 

 Triassic," &c. " Generically these periods are related to each other; they are, also, 

 to a certain extent, specifically connected ; it may, therefore, be fairly concluded that 

 the Permian Flora did not differ, to any material extent, from either the Carboniferous 

 or the Triassic." In regard to the molluscs, he says, " they bind together the 

 Carboniferous, Permian and Triassic systems. Several species of the Carboniferous 

 period continued to live, or were closely represented, in the Permian ; and a few 

 appear to have had their existence prolonged into the Triassic. There is a strong 

 generic, and a faint specific relation running through the three systems ; but taking 

 all the classes into consideration, especially the Palliobranchiate, the relation has 

 obviously more of a Protozoic than a Deuterozoic character." (p. xxv.) 



In regard to the Permian fishes, Professor King considers them to be specifically 

 distinct from those of the Carboniferous rocks. In its reptilian fauna, he says, as yet 

 we cannot form any satisfactory conclusion, as to whether the Permian system is 

 more related to the Carboniferous than to the Triassic. " The occurrence of 

 Labyrinthodons and Rhynchosaurs in the Triassic rocks, and, according to the 

 determination of Von Meyer, of Labyrinthodont forms {Archigosaurus and Sckro- 

 phalus) in the coal measures of Germany, shows that there is a strong reptilian 

 connexion between the Carboniferous and Triassic systems." He considers "on 

 hypothetical grounds, we are warranted in anticipating, that future researches will 

 establish a more intimate reptilian connexion than at present prevails between these 

 systems and the one intermediate to them — the Permian." His conclusions are that 

 the Permian deposits are " co-ordinate with, and intermediate to, the Carboniferous 

 and Triassic systems — including them in the Protozoic, rather than in the Deuterozoic 

 period." (p. xxvi.) 



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