52 A. C. Peale — Application of the Term Laramie. 



occur in this region. In view of all these erroneous correla- 

 tions, inevitable though the mistakes were, and in view of the 

 present widely different application of the term as used by 

 various authors, it becomes absolutely necessary that we 

 should return to the original definition and confine the name 

 Laramie to the beds that fit the definition and apply it now 

 and in the future only to such beds. This is all the more 

 necessary inasmuch as the Laramie beds in the original or 

 typical areas in Colorado east of the Front Range, although 

 restricted in thickness by Cross and Eldridge in taking from 

 the upper part (from above the break) the Arapahoe and Den- 

 ver, are characterized by a flora in which Dr. Knowlton rec- 

 ognizes 123 species, of which only 17 are common to the 

 Laramie and the Montana formations and 21 to the Laramie 

 and the Denver. These beds also contain an invertebrate 

 fauna of about 25 species of fresh and brackish water shells.* 



As already noted also, there is according to Veatch a series 

 of from 4000 to 6500 feet of beds in the Carbon and Evans- 

 ton areas on the Union Pacific Railroad which occupy the 

 stratigraphic position of the Laramie above the Fox Hills, but 

 which up to the present time are not known to contain any 

 fossil plantsf but do have some fresh and brackish water shells 

 which alone are inconclusive as to the age of the beds. 



After his introduction and a brief account of the confusion 

 in the present use of the term Laramie with a statement of 

 King's views, Mr. Veatch gives his idea as to the boundaries of 

 the Laramie Plains based mainly upon descriptions by Prof. 

 Cyrus Thomas and Mr. Arnold Hague, and acknowledges that 

 the name has been applied in both a restrictive and a broad 

 sense, crediting Hayden with having used it in both ways. 

 Mr. Yeatch then devotes seven pages to Hayden's investiga- 

 tions, in which he quotes Hayden's views as to the " Lignitic 

 Group," which is somewhat beside the question inasmuch as they 

 relate to what Hayden thought at various times between 1867 

 and 1875, before the term Laramie was proposed. Then fol- 

 low five pages detailing Hague's description of the Carbon area 

 and discussion of the age of the beds there exposed, and a 

 statement of " Cross's re-definition," after which he gives his 

 summary and conclusions.^: These conclusions are identical in 

 his article and in the abstract in this Journal,§ and it is with 

 these alone that we are concerned here. 



*TJ. S. Geol. and Geograph. Surv. of Territories, 11th Ann. Rept., 1879, 

 pp. 165, 190, 253. 



f In the Evanston area a few plants not specifically determinable have 

 been found. 



± The Journal of Geology, vol. xv, pp. 526-549, 1907. 



§ This Journal, vol. xxiv, pp. 18-22, 1907. 



