CARBONIFEROUS AGE. 



30T 



At Moresnet, near Aix, in shales under the Suhcarboniferous limestone, has been 

 found Cyclopteris Rcemeriana Gc pp., with Spirifer disjunctus Sow. A number of species 

 have been obtained in the Vosges, among them Catamites radiatus Brngt., Lepidvden- 

 dra, Knvrrice, Stigmarice. Heer has designated the horizon of these plants, the Ursa 

 stage- He refers to it the species from Bear Island, mentioned on page 283, and also 

 includes the species from the Yellow sandstone of Ireland, which underlies the Sub- 

 carboniferous slate and limestone, as stated on the same page. 



Animals, — The " Mountain limestone," like the American beds, is 

 noted for its Crinoids ; its Brachiopods, of the genera Productus and 

 Spirifer ; its Corals, of the genus Lithostrotion ; its Ganoid Fishes and 

 Sharks ; its few Amphibian relics ; and also for the absence of Trilo- 

 bites of all the old genera. There are also various Rhizopods ; and, 

 among them, the kind called Fusulina (Fig. 646, p. 332) is especially 

 interesting on account of its wide distribution, and its being exclu- 

 sively a Carboniferous type ; it is common in the Upper beds in Rus- 

 sia, the Southern Alps, Armenia, and Spain ; also the Carboniferous 

 beds of North America, but not the Subcarboniferous. 



Characteristic Species. 



Among Rhizopods, the limestone in northern England contains aggregations of the 

 spheroidal species, Saccammina Carteri Brady, occurring as groups of single isolated 

 spheroids, or occasionally of strings of them, the diameter of each averaging an eighth 



Figs. 605-607. 



Fig. 605, Hemipronites crenistria ; 606, Spirigera lamellosa ; 607, Terebratula hastata. 

 Figs. 608-610. 



Fig. 608, Productus longispinus; 609, Spirifer glaber ; 610, Nautilus (Trematodiscus) KoninckiL 



of an inch, though rarely a fifth of an inch, a remarkable size for this class. They lie 

 so closely together, that a mass seems to be made up of them. It is very abundant in 

 the "four-fathom " limestone of the English Subcarboniferous. The onlj- other species 



