Carboniferous Period in East Scotland. DSi 
XXIX.—Some Points in the Natural History of the Carboniferous 
Period in East Scotland. Address delivered on 23rd November 
1914 by the retiring Vice-President, B. N. Peach, LL.D., F.R.S. 
INTRODUCTION. 
In my Presidential address to this Society in November 1885, I cited 
several examples of the association of certain forms of animal and plant 
remains with particular kinds of sediment. In that address, given thirty 
years ago, I considered that the repeated disappearances of truly marine 
forms from strata between the limestones of the Scottish Carboniferous 
Series, and their reappearance with each successive limestone band gave 
evidence in support of Barrande’s Doctrine of Colonies. Later investigation, 
however, soon convinced me that the constant disappearance and reappearance 
were due only to migration of forms following a suitable habitat, and that the 
interval of time represented by our Scottish Carboniferous Limestone Series 
was insufficient to allow of any very appreciable genetic change in the truly 
marine forms. Hence, also, arose our difficulty in zoning this section of our 
Carboniferous rocks. Further study of the fossil contents of our Paleozoic 
rocks has led me to abandon Barrande’s fascinating doctrine entirely. In 
my present address, I purpose to amplify that part of my subject which was 
illustrated by examples taken from the Scottish Carboniferous rocks in the 
light of the experience gained during the recent revision of the Scottish 
Coal-fields by the Geological Survey. 
Upper OLD RED SANDSTONE. 
For the elucidation of my subject of address it. is necessary to describe 
the nature of the floor upon which the Carboniferous rocks were laid down, 
and the order of succession of those deposits in East Scotland (see Fig. 1, 
p. 239). 
The Old Red Sandstone period must have been one of considerable crustal 
movement in what is now Scotland, for the Upper Old Red Sandstone, which 
really forms the natural base of the Carboniferous series of rocks, is every- 
where unconformable to the rocks of all other formations older than itself, 
including those of Lower Old Red Sandstone age in the south, and the 
Middle Old Red Sandstone in the Orkneys. 
The study of the Upper Old Red Sandstone shows that it was an 
Epicontinental Formation, laid down upon a land surface, which, in the 
south of Scotland, was one of high relief, for we have still preserved to us, in 
