171 D.WHITE — RELATIVE AGES OF KANAWHA-ALLEGHENY 



SERIES 



5. The flora of the Stockton coal in southern West Virginia is typical 

 of the Allegheny series in Pennsylvania, its common species seeming to 

 indicate a place in the Clarion or lowest group of that series, while a 

 portion at least of the Kittanning flora, as well as the Freeport floras of 

 northwestern Pennsylvania, appear to occur in nearly typical develop- 

 ment and associations, as well as in regular order, above the Black 

 Flint, which immediately succeeds the Kanawha formation. 



G. \\ nile the evidence of the fossil floras distinctly shows the horao- 

 taxial representative of the Clarion group to be in the upper portion of 

 the Kanawha group, the preliminary and incomplete inspection of the 

 higher floras leads us to somewhat confidently expect that the equiva- 

 lents of the upper portion of the Kittanning group, as well as the entire 

 Freeport group, are to be found in the terranes above the Black Flint. 



7. The application of the names of the Allegheny coals to the several 

 individual coals of the Kanawha series is in direct contradiction to the 

 testimony of the fossil plants, since, so far my observations have ex- 

 tended, the earliest of the characteristic Allegheny floras is not found 

 far below the vicinity of the Stockton coal, hitherto supposed to be the 

 equivalent of the Upper Freeport of Pennsylvania, while the entire 

 lower group of Kanawha coals, hitherto supposed to include the Middle 

 Kittanning, Lower Kittanning, and Clarion coals, etcetera, of Pennsyl- 

 vania, are paleobotanically older than the lowest coal of the Allegheny 

 series. According to the evidence of the fossil floras, the Black Flint is 

 to be compared with the horizon of the ferriferous limestone rather than 

 with the phases of the Mahoning sandstone. 



• As has already been stated, the paleontologic data as yet in hand 

 from the Kanawha Mining and Coalburg seams are not sufficiently com- 

 plete to definitely indicate the relations of these two coals, which have 

 been regarded as Upper Kittanning and Lower Freeport respectively, to 

 the Allegheny series. It should, however, be noted that the fossils from 

 the roof of a coal on Kelleys creek, about 100 feet above the Cedar Grove 

 seam, have the characters of the Lower Group floras without showing 

 any of the distinctive paleontologic features of the Allegheny series. If 

 we assume the Coalburg and Kanawha Mining seams also to be refer- 

 able to the latter series, an assignment to any horizon above the Clarion 

 group seems to be clearly unwarranted. 



REASONS FOR ASSUMED CONTEMPORANEITY OF THE IDENTICAL FLORAS 



* The paleontologic conditions here shown to exist in the Allegheny 

 and Kanawha series admit of two explanations : («) either the ter- 



