436 PEOCEEDHSTGS OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. [DcC. 15,. 



, The discovery of this the third genus of Eeptiles found in the 

 uppermost sandstones of Elgin has, I confess, somewhat shaken the 

 belief expressed in the preceding pages, that these deposits are of as 

 remote an age as the Uppermost Old Eed Sandstone. So long as the 

 Stagonolepis and the little Teleiyeton were the only evidence appealed 

 to by paleeontologists to invalidate my inference as based on the ap- 

 parent stratigraphical succession and mineral character, I did not 

 attach undue weight to them, — the more so as those animals are 

 generically distinct from any fossil hitherto found. 

 . Now, however, that Professor Huxley informs me that the Hy^ 

 perodapedon is not only a lacertian reptile, but is closely allied to 

 the Triassic MhyncJiosaurus, and when I couple this determination 

 with what he before stated, viz. that the general affinities of the 

 Stagonolepis are also with Mesozoic reptiles, it becomes me to pause 

 in my geological conclusions. 



Throughout my researches I have invariably been mainly guided 

 by palseontological evidence, and have never before had such a diffi- 

 culty in reconciling it vpith the apparent succession and connexion 

 of the strata as in the present instance. It would, indeed, have 

 been much more in accordance with my long- cherished views, as a 

 progressionist, to have separated the reptiliferous sandstones from 

 the yellow ichthyolitic sandstones, really of the Old Eed age, on 

 which they rest. Not having, however, as yet been able to detect 

 any break or physical separation between the two deposits, and be- 

 lieving in the passage from the red to the yellow sandstones, and even 

 in their alternation, as shown on the banks of the Eindhom, I have 

 naturally been strongly influenced by these physical features. 



It is, however, just possible that, by a closer and longer survey, 

 the light-coloured sandstones of Eindrassie, Spynie, and the coast- 

 ridge, with their cornstones, may be found to be of a different age 

 from the mass of the similar yellow and whitish sandstones and 

 cornstones of Elgin, Bishop Mill, and the Eindhorn. In the endea- 

 vour to settle this question, it is my intention to revisit Morayshire 

 during this summer, and to re-examine these tracts, with the view 

 of laying any new evidence I may obtain on this point before the 

 ensuing Meeting of the British Association at Aberdeen.— E. I. M., 

 June 12, 1859. 



Tables explanatory of the General View of the Old Red or 

 Devonian Bocks. (See p. 414.) 



