46 
TUE GEOLOGIST. 
lections, liave enabled Professor Huxley to decide that, with the e.xception of tlie 
Tderpvton, all these casts, scales, and bones belong to the Reptile Stagonolejna 
liohei-tsonii. 
Sir Roderick having visited the quarries in the coast-ridge, from which slabs 
with impressions of reptilian footmarks had long been ol)tained, induced Mr. G. 
Gordon to transmit a variety of these, which are now in the Museum of Practical 
Geology ; and some of which were exhil iited at the meeting. 
After reviewing the whole succession of strata from the edge of the crystalline 
rocks in the interior to the bold cliffs on the sea-coast, the author has satisfied 
himself that the reptile-bearing samlstones must be considered to form the Upper- 
most i)ortion of the C)ld Red Sandstone, or Devonian grouj) ; the following being 
among the chief reasons for his adherence to this view. 
1st. That these sandstones have everywhere the same strike and dip as the 
inferior red sandstones containing Holopttjchii and other Old Red Ichtnyolites ; 
there being a jierfect conformity lietween the two rocks, and a gradual passage 
from the one into the other. 2dly. That the yellow and light colours of the upper 
band are seen in natural section to occur and alternate with red and green sand- 
stones, marls, and conglomerates low down in the ichthyolitic series. 3dly. That, 
whilst the concretionary limestones called " Cornstones" are seen amidst some of 
the lowest red and green conglomerates, they reai)pear in a younger and broader 
zone at Elgin, and re-occur above the Teleipeton-sandstone of Sp3Tiie Hill, and 
above the Stagonolepis-sandstone of Lossiemouth ; thus binding the whole into 
one natural physical group. 4thly. That, whilst the small patches of so-called 
" Wealden," or Oolitic strata, described by ]\Ir. Robertson and othere as occurring 
in this di.strict, are wholly uncomformable to, and rest upon, the eroded surfiices 
of all the rocks inider consideration, so it was shown that none of the Oolitic or 
I/iassic rocks of the opposite side of the Moray Frith, or those of Brora, Dunrobin, 
Ethie, &c., which are charged with Oolitic and Liassic remains, resemble the 
reptiliferous sandstones and "Cornstones" of Elgin or their repetitions in the 
coast-ridge extending from Burgh Head to Lossiemouth. 
Fully aware of the great (iifficulty of determining the exact boundary line 
between the Ujijiennost Devonian and Lowest Carboniferous strata, and knowing 
that they pass into each other in many countries, the author stated that no one 
coidd dogmatically assert that the reptile-bearing sandstones might not, by future 
researches, be proved to form the commencement of the younger era. 
Sir Roderick concluded by stating, that the conversion of the Starjonolepis into a 
reptile,of high organization, but of nondescript character, did not interfere with 
his long-cherished opinion — founded on acknowledged facts — as to the jirogressive 
succession of great classes of animals, and that, inasnuich as the earliest Trilobite 
of the invertelirate Lower Silurian era was as wondeifully organized as any living 
Cnistacean, so it did not unsettle his belief to lind that the earliest reittiles yet 
recognised, the Statjomlep/is and Tderpeton, pertained to a high order of that 
class. 
[The memoir was illustrated 1)y geologically-coloured charts of the Admiralty's 
Hydrographic Survey of the Coast, extending from the Orkney Islands to Banff- 
shire (which, in the want of any accurate maps, fortunately gives the outlines of 
the coast and a few miles inland), and by transverse sections sliowing the succes- 
sion and relations of the strata, as well a.s numerous organic remains from the 
collections of Mr. P. Duff, Mr. Gordon, the YAgm Jluseum, the Museum of 
Practical Geolf)gy, and the Geological Society's Mviseum.] 
3. " On the X/ai/onn/r/jIs Ilohertsonii of the Elgin Sandstones ; and on the Foot- 
marks in the Sandstimes of Cummingston." By Thomas H. Huxley, F.R.S., 
F.G.S., Prof of Natin-al History, Government School of Mines. 
The unquestionable remains of Starionolepis Robertsonii, which have hitherto 
been obtained, consist partly of bones and dermal scutes, and partly of the natural 
casts of such parts. The former have been ol)tained only at Lossiemouth, and are 
comparatively few in innnber ; the numerous natural casts, on the other hand, 
have all been procured at the Findrassie Quany, m which no bones or scutes in 
their original condition have been discovered. 
The consideralile series of remains exhibited to the Society did not embrace all 
those which had been subjected to examination, liut contained only a selection of 
