Ch. XXII.] CONNECTICUT BEDS. 45Y 



contorted rocks. The unconformable position of this New Red with 

 ornithichnites on the edges of the inclined primary or palaeozoic rocks 

 of the Appalachians is seen at 4 of the section, fig. 552 p. 497. The 

 absence of fish with decidedly heterocercal tails may afford an argu- 

 ment against the Permian age of the formation ; and the opinion that 

 the red sandstone is triassic seems, on the whole, the best that we can 

 embrace in the present state of our knowledge. 



In North Carolina, the late Professor Emmons has described the 

 strata of the Chatham coal-field, which correspond in age to those 

 near Richmond in Virginia. In beds underlying them he has met 

 with three jaws of a small insectivorous mammal, which he has called 

 Dromatherium sylvestre, closely allied to Spalacotherium. Its nearest 

 living analogue, says Professor Owen, " is found in Myrmecobius ; for 

 each ramus of the lower jaw contained ten small molars in a continu- 

 ous series, one canine, and three conical incisors — the latter being 

 divided by short intervals." There is every reason to believe that 

 this fossil quadruped is at least as ancient as the Microlestes of the 

 European Trias above described ; and the fact, as I have already re- 

 marked (p. 389), is highly important, as proving that a certain low 

 grade of marsupials had not only a wide range in time from the Trias 

 to the Purbeck or uppermost oolitic strata of Europe, but had also a 

 wide range in space, namely, from Europe to North America, in an 

 east and west direction, and, in regard to latitude, from Stonesfield, 

 in 52° N., to that of North Carolina, 35° K 



