28 CRETACEOUS PALEONTOLOGY. 



tion proper, as that term is used here, although a few of the 

 species described were secured from the higher beds here con- 

 sidered as representing the Magothy of Maryland. The flora 

 is totally different from that of the Potomac clays further south 

 in Maryland and Virginia from which beds Fontaine^ has 

 described 365 species, not one O'f which is certainly found in the 

 Raritan clays of New Jersey^. 



"The difference in the character of the vegetation is shown by the fact that 

 in the long list furnished by Professor Fontaine there are but 75 angiosperms 

 (about one-fifth of all), whereas in the New Jersey clays, throwing out 

 fragmentary and doubtful remains, of 156 described species all but 10 are 

 dicotyledonous plants.'' 



The fauna of the Raritan series is extremely meager. Conrad 

 described a little pelecypod shell from the "ash-colored clays near 

 Washington, Middlesex county," as Astarte veta,^ tlais species 

 must have come from the Raritan series, but it has not been met 

 with in any of the more recent collections. In addition. tO' this 

 Whitfield has described four other species as follows : 



Ambocardia cookn. 



Corbicula ? emacerata. 



Corbicula annosa. 



Gnathodon ? tenuidens. 



Three of these species, viz., A. cookii, C. annosa and G. f 

 tenmdens, occur in S^yre and Fisher's clay pits, at Sayreville; 

 two, viz., A. cookii and G. f tenuidens, occur also at Valentine's 

 clay pits near Woodbridge; two, ahz., C. f emacerata and C. 

 annosa, are recorded from near Woodbridge with no definite 

 locality specified; and one, viz., A. cookii, occurs also at East 

 Brunswick. All of these localities are in the lower portion of 

 the Raritan formation, and, although the generic relations of all 

 the species are more or less in doubt, all seem to be of brackish- 

 water types, just such forms as might be expected toi occur in 

 beds having the estuarine origin of these Raritan clays aftd 

 sands. 



^ The Potomac or Younger Mesozoic Flora, by W. M. Fontaine, Monog. 

 U. S. G. S., vol. XV (1889). 

 ' Newberry, loc. cit., 0. 2X 



