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They make the lower slopes of the Serra Geral, and extend from 
S. Paulo through Parana, Santa Catharina, and Rio Grande do Sul. The 
deep red color, mottled with patches of dirty or creamy white on glo- 
bular and lenticular masses, appears to be a characteristic feature of 
these sandy beds, the explanation of which is not entirely clear. The 
most plausible theory to account for these light colored blotches in the 
midst of red sediments being that the coloring pigment or oxide of 
iron is an invasion of the more or less white sand deposit, and that 
some portions of the mass were not reached by the infiltrating waters 
which carried the iron. This peculiarity is especially marked in road 
and railway cuttings, and may be observed at many points between 
Margem do Taquary and Santa Maria in Rio Grande do Sul. It is also 
finely exhibited in the deep railway cut just east from Cacequy in the 
same state. 
Some of these beds are also light green in color, and the brick 
red, or chocolate shales, often alternate with the greenish bands as 
may often be seen along the railway between Iraly and Porto da Uniao 
in southern Parana. 
No time could be spent on the detailed study of these beds, but they 
appear to contain the trunks of fossil trees which are quite numerous 
in the vicinity of Santa Maria, Rio Grande do Sul. Dr. Cicero Campos 
reports seeing many of these trunks in the same formation, 12 kilome- 
ters north-west from Salto Apparado on Rio Tibagy, Parana. 
Fossil Reptile (Scaphonyx) 
In this vari-colored sandstone horizon at Santa Maria, in the state 
of Rio Grande do Sul, Dr. Jango Vischer in 1902 discovered some fossil 
bones which he sent to Dr. H. von Ihering, Director of the Museu Pau- 
lista at S. Paulo, and which have been described for publication in 
Revista do Museu Paulista, by Dr. A. Smith Woodward of the British 
Museum. Dr. Woodward haskindly furnished the Commission with a 
copy of his paper on the subject, since the volume containing the 
original has not yet been published by the Museum in question. 
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