NO. 2.] GEOLOGICAL SKETCH BY NANSEN. 



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the highest part, about 900 feet (275 m.) or 950 feet above sea-level (see fig. 1, k 

 and fig. 3, k). These were in fragments of brown sandy rock which Mr. Teall 

 found to be composed of „grains of quartz, fragments showing plant structure, 

 and a few flakes of white and brown mica". These pieces were loose, in a 

 slight hollow, as though caused by a runlet of water. They appeared to have 

 been washed loose out of a bed of similar, but frozen rock underlying them" i. 



These fossils may perhaps belong to a stratum which is situated higher 

 in th6 basalt than the bed before mentioned, perhaps between the third and 

 fourth or between the fourth and fifth tiers of basalt (counting from below). 

 Judging from Newton and Teall's description, this brown sandy rock seems 

 to be more like that of the plant-bed on the nunatak to the north, visited 

 by Kcettlitz and myself, though it „is somewhat coarser", and then our shale 

 to the north contains very httle sand. That they are found at different 

 heights may be accounted for by the possibihty that there has been a dislo- 

 cation just north of the place where these fossils were found; and as we 

 know nothing as to the height above the base of the basalt, of the plant- 

 bearing bed overlying the nunatak to the north, it may very well be that it 

 has been situated between the same, or nearly the same tiers. The fossils 

 from these two localities can hardly, however, belong to exactly the same 

 horizon, as I think the distance between them (see fig. 1) is too small to 

 account for the difference in the deposit in which they are preserved. 



I quite agree with Kcetthtz when he does not consider it probable 

 that these plant-bearing strata have been lifted by intrusive sheets in such 

 extensive and horizontal thin beds; nor can I understand how the flows of 

 basalt could have become so regular and horizontal, if they had been intrusive 

 masses extending themselves in soft clay, like that of Gape Flora. A glance 

 at the regular, horizontal basalt-beds in figs. 2 and 3 will hardly, I think, 

 make one feel inclined a priori to assume such a possibility. 



It would also be extremely difficult, as Koetthtz points out, to explain 

 how the tree-trunks and branches now carbonized or „ charred into charcoal" 

 (also partly silicified) could have been enclosed in the basalt sheets which 

 underlie the plant-bearing beds, if the basalt is intrusive. I think with Kcettlitz 

 that there cannot be much doubt that these tree-trunks have chiefly belonged 



> See also Newton and Teall, I c. 1898, p. 648 (a). 



