C. A. White—Fossil Faunas and Floras. BS: 
certain deposits along our sea coasts are referred with confi- 
dence by most paleontologists to the Hocene, Miocene and 
Pliocene epochs respectively, as those epochs are recognized 
among Kuropean formations. Certain of our great intra-conti- 
nental deposits are also referred to those three epochs with 
equal confidence; and yet no direct paleontological proof has 
been adduced that any one deposit of either of these two North 
American series was, even approximately, contemporaneous 
with any one of the other series. By direct proof I of course 
mean that which is furnished by specific identification of fossil 
remains or derived from well comprehended phenomena of 
physical changes, as contrasted with theoretical inferences de- 
rived from a foreign standard, and assumed to be of rigid 
application here. Still, in view of the reasonable hope that 
great discoveries of fossil continental faunas and floras are yet 
to be made, and much concerning the physical geology of the 
continent is yet to be learned, we ought not to despair of ob- 
taining some of the direct proof which is so desirable. An 
encouraging fact in this direction is the one lately pointed out 
by Professor Ward that four of the species of plants which 
occur in the Laramie Group occur also in the Lignitic deposits 
of the marine Tertiary series of the Gulf States ;* and when 
the tossil floras of the continent are thoroughly known, much 
more information of this kind may be expected from them. 
Now in ease the specific identifications referred to should be 
made, and the contemporaneity of the formations be thereby 
proved, what effect ought that circumstance to have upon the 
nomenclature of formations already recognized and named? 
For example, the Laramie formation was deposited in a great 
brackish-water inland sea, and it contains a characteristic aque- 
ous fauna which is distinct from that of any other known 
formation. Other deposits were of course simultaneously 
formed along the sea coasts, and perhaps upon other parts of 
the continent also, all of which contain remains of faunas that, 
so far as known, differ materially from those of the Laramie, 
and also from each other. Among those which probably con- 
tain a flora similar to that of the Laramie are the Kocene Lig- 
nitic of the Gulf States, and certain deposits upon the Pacific 
Coast in Washington Territory, which have been investigated 
to some extent by Professor Newberry. Among the marine 
formations which were deposited simultaneously with the 
Laramie, is almost certainly a part of the Chico-Téjon series of 
California. 
In view of the extent and importance of the intra-continental 
deposits of North America, and the radical differences of their 
fossil remains from those of the marine formations, it is plain 
* Sixth Ann. Report Director U. S. Geol. Survey, p. 529. 
