184 



PROCEEDINGS OK THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



[Jan. 8, 



plant-remains at Eathie, led to the futile attempts to find coal here 

 which have been already referred to. 



Fossils from Eathie (Cromarty), Upper Oolite. 



Ichthyosaurus (vertebrae). 

 Fish-remains (jaws, Bcales, plates, 



bones, and teeth). 

 Aspidorhynchus, sp. 

 Belemnites spicularis, Phil. 



obeliscus, Phil. 



abbreviatus, Mill. 



Ammonites mutabilis, Sow. 



— , var. 



alternans, Von Buch. 



, var. 



Beaugrandi, Sauv. et Rig. 



• flexuosus, Quenst. 



triplicatus, Sow. 



biplex, Sow. 



Ammonites biplex, Sow., var. 



Eudoxus, jy Orb. 



Calisto, J)' Orb. 



Gravesianus, If Orb. 



Turbo, sp. 



Avicula, sp. 



Lima concentrica, Sow., sp. 



, sp. 



Nucula, sp. 



Pecten, sp. 



Ostrea Ecemeri, Quenst. 



Conifers (leaves and cones). 



Cycads (leaves, buds, stems, &c). 



Ferns (fronds). 



Wood. 



The marine fossils of the Upper Oolite beds indicate that they 

 agree in age with the middle and lower parts of the English Kim- 

 meridge Clay, the zones of Ammonites mutabilis and A. alternans 

 of Dr. "Waagen. 



The general assemblage of fossils presented by these Upper Oolite 

 beds in the north of Scotland more closely resembles that found in 

 some of the French equivalents, in which we have evidence of very 

 similar littoral conditions, than that of the Kimmeridge Clay of 

 England, in which the conditions are somewhat different. The re- 

 markable flora of these beds is of the highest interest, and promises 

 to yield very valuable contributions to our knowledge of the succes- 

 sion of terrestrial plant-life during the Jurassic period, when it 

 shall have been fully studied. 



Fragments of the grits and limestones of the Upper Oolite, con- 

 taining their characteristic fossils, are by no means rare in the 

 Boulder-clay of Elginshire, and have also been detected in Aberdeen- 

 shire and Caithness ; and masses of blue clay containing the same 

 fossils as the beds at Eathie have been found at Blackpots in Banff- 

 shire, Plaidy in Aberdeenshire, and several other localities in the 

 north-east of Scotland. 



§ 9. The Neocomian. 



The question of the former existence of strata of this age in Scot- 

 land still remains an open one. Fragments of rock containing the 

 characteristic fossils of the Neocomian have certainly been found 

 enclosed in the Boulder-clay of Elginshire and the adjoining counties ; 

 but when we remember a fact which I have pointed out in a pre- 

 vious memoir, namely the great abundance of boulders of rock of 

 this age which are everywhere scattered through the glacial deposits 

 of the North-European area, it becomes us to pause before unhesita- 

 tingly referring the fragments in question, which are by no means 

 numerous, to a Scottish origin. On the other hand it must be re- 



