CAKBONIFEROUS UNDIVIDED. 399 



of the brachiopods. * * * jj^ ^]^g feature the fauna strikingly resembles the depauperate 

 Spergen Hill fauna. The presence in the fauna of a small specimen of Pentremites or a closely 

 allied genus is also worthy of note in this connection. Although extremely abundant in the 

 Mississippi Valley, this blastoid has been recognized at but two localities in the Rocky Moun- 

 tains, and in both of these occurrences it is associated with a fauna closely resembling the 

 Spergen Hill fauna. 



B 5. ENDICOTT RANGE, ALASKA. 



The Fickett " series," a very thick sequence of strata comprising a great variety 

 of sedimentary rocks, was observed by Schrader in traversing the Endicott Range, 

 longitude 150°-155° west. Lower Carboniferous fossils occur in pebbles found in 

 gravels derived from it. Brooks ^°" summarizes the observations as follows : 



During his exploration of the Anaktuvuk, in northern Alaska, Schrader traversed a belt of 

 phyllites, chloritic schists, limestones, slate, sandstone, quartzite, grit, and conglomerates 

 about 50 miles in width. In spite of the heterogeneity of these rocks and the uncertainty of their 

 interrelations, the hasty character of the field observation made it necessary to group them in 

 one formation, the Fickett series. The only fossils encountered were La the stream gravels and 

 were evidently derived from beds in this series, and on this evidence the entire succession was 

 provisionally assigned to the Lower Carboniferous. The Fickett overlies the Skajit (SUurian ?) 

 on the south by an unconformable overlap, and on the north it is cut off by a fault from the 

 Lisburne (Carboniferous) . Schrader states that the Fickett and Lisburne series bear an uncon- 

 formable relation. 



The Fickett series, which may have a thickness of 8,000 to 10,000 feet, has a basal member 

 made up of shale, slate, and limestone, succeeded by quartzite, grit, and conglomerate, and then 

 by slate and micaceous sandstone. It is in this part of the section that the limestone is supposed 

 to occur which yielded the Carboniferous' fossils of the stream gravels. A still higher member 

 includes sandstone, limestone, quartzite, schists, slate, and conglomerate, succeeded by quartz 

 schists and green chloritic schists, the latter often cut by quartz veins. It is not made clear why 

 the most highly altered members should occur at the top of the series, for while it is true that 

 these metamorphosed rocks lie near one of the axes of intense folding, it would be expected that 

 the same metamorphic effect would have been noted at the northern limit of the section, where 

 another locus of extreme deformation was observed. 



S-T 10-14, T 15, AND TJ 17-20. BARING (OR BANKS) LAND, PARRY ISLANDS, ELLES3\£ERE 



LAND, AND GBINNELL LAND. 



Haughton's description of the Arctic Carboniferous is quoted by Low ^^°^ as 

 comprising the principal known facts regarding the Parry Islands: 



The southern boundary of the Carboniferous sandstones with their included coal seams 

 crosses the southern part of Banks Island in a north-northeast direction, and they consequently 

 cover the northern two-thirds of that island, while the extreme northwest portion of Victoria 

 Island is also occupied by these rocks. The western Parry Islands, on the north side of Mel- 

 ville Sound, are almost wholly formed of these rocks, whose southern boundary strikes northeast 

 across the northern half of Cornwallis Island. They are found again in Grinnell Peninsula, the 

 northwest portion of North Devon, and again on the western side of Ellesmere, in the vicinity of 

 Store Bjornekap, being probably largely developed in the northeast part of that great island. 



These rocl^ are described as follows by Prof. Haughton: 



"The Upper Silurian limestones, already described, are succeeded by a most remarkable 

 series of close-grained white sandstone, containing numerous beds of highly bituminous coal 

 and but few marine fossils. In fact, the only fossil shell found in these beds, as far as I know, 

 in any part of the Arctic Archipelago, is a species of ribbed Atrypa, which I believe to be identical 

 with the Atrypa fallax of the Carboniferous slate of Ireland. These sandstone beds are succeeded 

 by a series of blue limestone beds containing an abundance of marine shells, commonly found in 



