4 



THE GEOLOGIST. 



That something like this has taken place seems indicated by the 

 film-like character of such specimens of wood as those we have 

 referred to, in which cases the sulphuret of iron was probably de- 

 posited in the fine parting between the wood and the bark. More- 

 over, the casts of the teredo-holes are covered over with the same 

 film of red oxide of iron, which has resulted from the decomposition 

 at a subsequent period of the sulphuret. 



Although we attempt not then to determine their family or genera, 

 we are not doing bad service to science in drawing attention to these 

 fossil cretaceous fruits. The very knowledge of their existence will 

 stimulate other observers to seek for more illustrative examples. 

 "What one is defective in, another may possess, and so from one to 

 the other we may gain a general knowledge of the whole organism 

 long before any perfect specimen has been brought to light. 



In the present case we submit our plates and figures of these 

 fruits, and leave the honour of naming them open to him who can 

 really tell us What they are. 



ON THE INAPPLICABILITY OP THE NEW TEEM 

 "DYAS" TO THE "PEEMIAN" GEOUP OF EOCKS, 

 AS PEOPOSED BY DE. GEINITZ. 



COMMUOTCATED BY 



Sir Eoderick Impet MrECHisoN, P.E.S., D.C.L., LL.D., etc., 



Director- General of the Geological Survey of Britain. 



In the year 1859, M. Marcou proposed to substitute the word 

 "Dyas" for " Permian," and summed up his views by saying that he 

 regarded " the New Eed Sandstone, comprising the Dy as and Trias, 

 as a great geologic period, equal in time and space to the Palaeozoic 

 epoch or the Greywacke (Silurian and Devonian), the Carboniferous 

 (Mountain-limestone and Coal), the Mesozoie (Jurassic and Creta- 

 ceous), the Tertiary (Eocene, Miocene, and Pliocene), and the recent 

 deposits (Quaternary and later)" I ! * 



As that autlior, who had not been in Eussia, criticized the labours 

 and inductions of my associates De Yerneuil and Yon Keyserling, and 

 myself, in liaving proposed the word " Permian" for tmcts in which 

 he surmised that we had commingled with our Permian deposits 

 much red rock of the age of the Trias, I briefly defended the views 



* See ' Dyas et Trias de Mavcoii,' Bibliotlieque Universelle de Geneve, 1859. 



