390 
SILURIA. 
[Chap. XVI. 
CHAPTER XVI. 
PALAEOZOIC ROCKS OF THE HARZ, THE RHENISH PROVINCES OF 
PRUSSIA, AND BELGIUM. 
UPPER SILURIAN, DEVONIAN, AND CARBONIFEROUS ROCKS OP THE HARZ. — DEVONIAN AND 
CARBONIFEROUS ROCKS OF THE RHINE AND ITS AFFLUENTS. — DEVONIAN AND CARBONI- 
FEROUS DEPOSITS OF WESTPHALIA AND BELGIUM. 
Iir advancing westwards from Central Germany, by the Harz *, to the 
Rhenish Provinces of Prussia, the geologist loses all traces of the Lower 
Silurian rocks of Bohemia, Saxony, and the Thiiringerwald ; whilst, with 
a little Upper Silurian, the Devonian and Carboniferous deposits become 
vastly more expanded. Yet, with this absence of the oldest fossiliferous 
strata, the regions under consideration present as venerable an exterior, 
and contain rocks possessing quite as crystalline a structure, as those of 
which we have just taken leave. For, if we first glance at the range of 
the Harz — that shrine at which many poets have worshipped Nature in 
fantastic forms, and where the German geologist long regarded his old 
' Grauwacke ' as a mass the order and age of which could never be 
defined, — its chief portions were first ascertained by Sedgwick and my- 
self f to be of no more remote antiquity than the Devonian era. 
The giant Brocken itself, sanctified by many an ancient legend, is a 
mere upstart, compared with the surrounding eruptive masses, which dis- 
turbed the bottom of the primeval sea. That mountain is composed of 
two kinds of granite, which, having burst forth long after the slaty rocks 
of Carboniferous age had been accumulated, has through ages of decom- 
position been arranged into those chaotic piles or ' Felsen-Meere,' so gra- 
phically described by Leopold von Buch. Again, subsequent outbursts of 
porphyry, during the accumulation of the Permian deposits, were also 
manifestations of the subterranean forces which produced the last great 
elevation of the Harz, and gave to the chain as well as the surrounding 
Secondary formations their present outline ; for, unlike the prevalent 
north-east and south-west strike of the older rocks in most parts of Eu- 
* I first visited the Harz in 1830, and secondly Morris was my companion (see Quart. Journ. 
in 1839, — on both occasions in company with Prof. G-eol. Soc. Lond. vol. xi. p. 409) ; and my last ex- 
Sedgwick; and the general order of the chain, cursion to the same tract was in 1857, accompanied 
which we published in 1839, has proved substan- by Prof. Eupert Jones. On my own part I am 
tially correct, — subject always to that reformed bound to state that the doubt expressed in a 
interpretation of the exact relative value of the note, p. 362, of the first edition of this work, con- 
various sedimentary rocks which is now applied cerning the existence of Upper Silurian rocks in 
to this tract and the Ehenish Provinces. By re- the Harz, has now been removed, and that, in any 
ferring to that instructive work, the ' Palseontogra- fresh issue of the Geological Map of Europe, I 
phica ' of Dunker and Hermann von Meyer, the will endeavour to represent (if the small scale 
reader, in obtaining much information respecting admit of it) the existence of Silurian as well 
the fossils of the Harz, as described by Adolf as of Devonian and Carboniferous rocks in the 
Eiimer, will perceive, at p. 71, vol. ii. part 2, Harz. 
how inverted and confused the order of succession f See Trans. G-eol. Soc. Lond., 2nd ser., vol. vi. 
appears. My next visit was in 1854, when Prof. pp. 283 &c. 
