238 CHALK OF FAXOE. [Ch. XVIl. 



and a great part of the skeleton have been found. Such remains are 

 ohieflv met with in the soft freestone, the principal member of the 



Fig. 247. 



ITemipneustes radiatus, Ag. 



Spntangus radiatus, La,m. 



Chalk of Maestricht and white 



chalk. 



sea-clilfs at Stevenskhnt resting on wliite chalk with 



JTosasaurus cainper L Original more than 3 feet long. 



Maestricht beds. Among the fossils common to the Maestricht and white 

 chalk may be instanced the echinoderm (fig. 248). 



I saw proofs of the previous denudation of the white chalk exhibited 

 in the lower bed of the Maestricht formation rig. 248. 



in Belgium, about 30 miles S. W. of Maestricht, 

 at the village of Jendrain, where the base of 

 the newer deposit consisted chiefly of a layer 

 of well-rolled, black, chalk-flint pebbles, in the 

 midst of which perfect specimens of Thecidca 

 radians and Belemnites mucronatiis are im- 

 bedded. 



Chalk of Faxoe. — In the island of Seeland, 

 in Denmark, the newest member of the chalk 

 series, seen in the 



flints, is a yellow limestone, a portion of which, at Faxoe, where it is 

 used as a building-stone, is composed of corals, even more conspicuously 

 than is usually observed in recent coral reefs. It has been quarried to 

 the depth of more than 40 feet, but its thickness is unknown. The im- 

 bedded shells are chiefly casts, many of them of univalve mollusca, which 

 are usually very rare in the white chalk of Europe. Thus, there are two 

 species of Cyprcea^ one of Oliva, two of Mitra^ four of the genus 

 Cerithium, six of Fusus, two of Trochus, one Patella^ one Emarginula^ 

 &c. ; on the whole, more than thirty univalves, spiral or patelliform. At 

 the same time, some of the accompanying bivalve shells, echinoderms, and 

 zoophytes are specifically identical with fossils of the true Cretaceous 

 series. Among the cephalopoda of Faxoe may be mentioned Bacu- 

 Utes Favjasil and Belemnites mucronatas^ shells of the white chalk. 

 The JVautilus Danicus (see fig. 249) is characteristic of this formation ; 

 and it also occurs in France in the calcaire pisolitique of Laversin (dept. 

 of Oise). 



