THE STATE GEOLOGIST. 59 



been found, though less plentifully, and on some slabs may be 

 seen impressions of rain-drops that fell incredibly long ages ago. 

 All these facts are of significance for our present purpose, but 

 there are others more important. We know that deposition of 

 Triassic sediments over both the areas under consideration was 

 accompanied by great volcanic activity, and the question at once 

 arises whether there may have been any connection between such 

 phenomena and the sudden mortality of fishes on a large scale. 

 An affirmative answer appears to us not only legitimate, but 

 highly plausible. 



If one inquires what are the reasons for believing that the 

 mortality was accomplished suddenly and on an extensive scale, 

 it may be pointed out that no other explanation can account for 

 the remarkable abundance of these fish remains in beds of limited 

 thickness ; hence, the destruction must be attributed to some un- 

 usual cause or causes. Now, amongst the possible causes which 

 are known to have produced similar results in other instances, 

 those which proceed from volcanic and seismic disturbances 

 acquire force by reason of the established contemporaneity of 

 these agencies. The conditions which we are justified in suppos- 

 ing to have existed here were not such as involve the partial or 

 total evaporation of land-locked waters, or irruptions from the 

 outer sea into sheltered, more or less brackish inlets. Nor does 

 the copious discharge of fresh water from the mouths of estuaries 

 offer a likely explanation for so widespread a destruction of 

 ichthyic life. To assume that these creatures perished from an 

 outbreak of parasitic diseases would be a wanton hypothesis. 

 There remains finally the pleausible conjecture of earthquake 

 shocks and volcanic explosions — the two 1 being closely related — 

 shocks killing marine life by the violence of the concussion, and 

 volcanoes either from the heat of the lava, or from the abundance 

 of ashes and poisonous gases. 



It has been repeatedly observed that earthquake shocks have 

 been followed by the washing ashore of vast quantities of dead 

 fish. The learned Greek geographer, Strabo, 1 for instance, men- 



J The account given by Strabo (Geog. vi., 2, 11) of the destruction of fish 

 life by submarine disturbances in the vicinity of the Lipari Islands, near Sicily, 

 reads as follows : 



