DEVONIAN. 341 



B, 3. CAPE LISBXJBNB. 



At Cape Lisburne Collier '^*''^^'' found 2,000 feet of sandstone and slate, con- 

 formably underljdng Carboniferous (Mississippian) strata, and provisionally assigned 

 them to the Devonian. 



S 27. EASTERN COAST OF GREENLAND. 



The Devonian of northeast Greenland is described by Nathorst,*'"''* who says: 



The Silurian strata, as we have seen, are folded and compressed and partly metamor- 

 phosed. If this bears any relation to the formation of a mountain range, the folding took 

 place before the deposition of the Devonian strata, for the latter show only a relatively shght 

 amount of disturbance. Otherwise it must be surmised that the folding was the result of a 

 depression of the Silurian strata along a fault at their eastern border, or perhaps between such 

 a fault and another which can be imagined as passing west of the present boundary of the 

 Archean. 



On the eastern side of Waltershausen Glacier, north of the mouth of the Myskox Fiord, 

 the wall of the fiord is composed of a light-gray, nearly horizontal sandstone, upon which are 

 situated two hUls of red sandstone. At the place where North Fiord turns toward Josefs Fiord 

 there is a shght synchne, the center of which is composed of red sandstone. As the height 

 of the mountain here, according to Desen's calculation is 1,500 meters, the thickness of the 

 formation in question ought to be still somewhat greater. On the south side of Franz Josefs 

 Fiord the Silurian strata south of Cape Weber are overlain by gray sandstone, dipping eastward, 

 and this is in turn followed by red sandstone. The dip then changes to west, so that the gray 

 sandstone crops out again, then again dips east, and disappears. At Cape Graah (the point 

 north of Dusen's Fiord) the dip is again west and a gray-green sandstone is again visible. But 

 I am not sure whether this belongs to the lower gray sandstone or is a member of the red; the 

 latter view seems to me to be the most probable. In the gray-green sandstone, which is very 

 micaceous, I collected at our place of anchorage, the 30th of August, some faint impressions 

 of fossil plants, hke those found in the Devonian strata of Spitzbergen, and a fish scale; and 

 in the red sandstone, which overlies the green, I and Forester Nilson found many fine specimens 

 which, according to A. Smith Woodward, belong to Holoptychius nobilissimus. Ag. Dusen, 

 who botanized in the mountain to the south, said he found moUusks in the sandstone there. 

 On a little outjutting point just east of here the rocks changed, being more brownish red and 

 tough, with yellowish layers. * * * 



The Devonian strata on EUas Island are separated from the Silurian by a fault. This 

 Devonian part possibly lies only in a local depression. But also north of Cape Weber there 

 is a sharp fault between the two systems; the Devonian is lower in relation to the Silurian. 

 On the south side of Franz Josefs Fiord the Devonian strata appeared to rest conformably 

 upon the Silurian, although the Silurian strata appeared to have been deformed. Nearly 

 everywhere this appeared to be the case near the contact between the two, and in my 

 notebook I used a special term, "the irregular red," for this zone of deformation. 



S-TJ 15-20. ARCTIC ARCHIPELAGO AND NORTHWESTERN GREENLAND. 



The occurrence of Devonian strata on the eastern coast of Grinnell Land 

 was mentioned by Dawson.^"^ A full section is described by Schei from the 

 southwestern shores of EUesmere Land. (See pp. 266-268, Chapter V.) 



