197 



7- Near Tai-yuen-fu/* Shan-si. 

 Orthothetcs crenistria Phill. 

 Productus scuiircticiilatus Fi.EMM. 



We have at present good reason to believe that the principal coal-bearing 

 series in Shan-si, like that of Shan-tung, southern Manchuria and northern 

 Corea, is Stepbanian in age ; it is a question still unsettled whether there may 

 really exist an older coal-bearing series with intercalation of marine sediments 

 which contain the Lower Carboniferous fauna cited by Frech. The geolo- 

 gical notes given by Richthoi^en'^' himself, as well as those by VViLLis-Bt-ACK- 

 WELDER,^^ only confirm us in the opinion tliat the general rock-succession in 

 Shan-si is quite similar to that in Shan-tung, the thick " Kohlenkalk " of> 

 RiCHTHOFEN being succeeded upward by a coal-bearing series and a " Ueber- 

 kohlensandstein." The Kohlenkalk of Richthofen represents the upper part 

 of the Cambro-Ordovician Ki-chou*' formation of Wili.is-Blackvvelder ; the 

 above mentioned marine fossils are found not in the " Kohlenkalk," but in 

 the overlying coal-bearing series. The latter, called the Shan-si system by 

 WiLi,is-Bi,ACKWELDEK, shows at its base obscure sign of unconformity,^* 

 as is also the rule in southern Manchuria and northern Corea; so far as we are 

 aware at present, there is absolutely no evidence in favour of the view that 

 there are in Shan-si two coal-bearing series, one of the Permocarboniferous 

 and the other of tlie Lower Carboniferous age. The simple inference from 

 the geology of Shan-tung and the land adjacent leads me to doubt the deve- 

 lopnieiit of Lower Carboniferous rocks, marine as well as coal-bearing forma- 

 tions, in the tracts in Shan-si traversed by Richthofen and Wh.us- Black- 

 welder. Hence the marine fossils described b}' P'rech need revision. 

 8. Near Hsin-tan, between the Mitan and the Lukan gorges of the Yang- 



tse-kiang ; as once cited above, the limestone contains 



ZapJirentis delanoui M. P'.. & PI. 



Z. giicrangvri M. PI & H. 



1 ) Tai-yuen-fu = ^^ig^ft^ 



2) Richthofen: China, vol. IL, chap. VIIL and IX. 



3) Research in China, vol. I., r, section 11. 



4) Ki-chou = ^^ 



5) Research in China, voi. 1., 1, p. 147. 



