148 ME. H. KYNASTON ON THE [May 1 894, 



coral-reefs, and the whole is of a littoral facies and denotes a tropical 

 climate. 



When we reach the top of this series, however, conditions seem 

 gradually to have altered, and we find quite shallow-water deposits 

 constituting the micaceous sandstones and flags, with occasional 

 bands of coarse grit. The abundant ripple-marks, worm-tracks, and 

 obscure remains of plants and fragments of wood are sufficient proof 

 of their shallow-water origin and the proximity of land. The mica 

 so abundant in these beds was probably derived from the denudation 

 of some of the older schistose and gneissic rocks of the central 

 portion of the chain. Depression, however, gradually followed 

 again, and we get beds of rather deeper-water origin, viz. the sandy, 

 red, grey, and mottled marls, without any organic remains, and 

 these again are succeeded by shallower-water beds, forming the 

 grits and conglomerates at the top of the whole series. There is 

 nothing to prove whether these unfossiliferous beds were of fresh- 

 water or marine origin. It is evident that elevation was going on 

 towards the close of the period in which the fossiliferous marls were 

 deposited, and it is rather difficult to account for so complete, 

 though so gradual, a change in the lithological and palaeontological 

 character of the rock, unless we suppose that at about that time the 

 Gosau district was cut off by this elevation from free communication 

 with the open sea, and constituted for the rest of the Cretaceous 

 period a lake-basin. 



Since the Gosau Beds of the Gosau Valley are tilted up so that 

 their average dip is in a southerly direction — and the dip is frequently 

 3teep in the northern part of the valley, while most of the beds 

 towards the south, especially on the Iiessenberg, are almost hori- 

 zontal — it would follow that the greatest amount of elevation took 

 place in the northern portion of the area, especially since we find 

 there the basal conglomerate at almost as high a level as the marl 

 series of the Hornspitze. Land evidently lay to the south in the 

 direction of the central axis of elevation of the Eastern Alps, and 

 open sea to the north and north-west. Now it is in the north and 

 north-west of the area that the beds are much tilted and disturbed, 

 and in the south that we find the micaceous sandstones and sandy 

 marls. Hence, if this elevation of the northern part of the area, 

 which, as we have seen, began towards the close of what may be 

 called ' the fossiliferous period,' continued to any great extent, the 

 southern portion would have been cut off from communication with 

 the sea, and so would have constituted a lake-basin, with a river 

 running into it from the south. 



The occurrence in the upper unfossiliferous beds of ripple-marks 

 and worm-tracks would rather seem to negative the idea of lofty 

 mountainous features existing in the immediate neighbourhood, 

 since lakes in mountainous districts usually have steep, shelving 

 sides, which would not allow of the tranquil deposition of sediment 

 in very shallow water on an almost horizontal floor. 



Several authors have supposed that the Gosau Beds were de- 

 posited in bays or fjords represented by parts of the present 



