44 The American Geoloyist. January, 1897 
tli('aliiig that the age of some was Calciferous, others Chazy, 
others Black River and others even Trenton, belonged to a 
specfal fauna, older than the second fauna or Chanii)lain di- 
vision of Dr. P]mnions; they are in company with forms re- 
calling the primordial fauna or true Taconic, but are new 
forms which developed completel}^ f^nly in the period of the 
second fauna proper and were found at Pointe Levis and 
Phillipsburgh, only in a sporadic state witliout tlie great de- 
velopment they attained during the deposits of the strata of 
the second fauna. In one word, we have in some of those 
limestone islets the phenomena of colonies, as defined by 
Barrande. After careful surveys at Pointe Levis, Quebec 
city, Phillipsburgh, Highgate-fall, Highgate Springs, Swan- 
ton and St. Albans" bay it was evident that we have there di- 
rectly in contact and in perfect stratigraphic conformity with 
the Georgia formation a mass of strata, mainly black slates, 
of a thickness at least of 5,000 feet, containing now and then 
lenticular masses or islets of limestone, sometimes very nu- 
merous and forming large massifs like that at Phillipsburgh 
and Shoreham, and at other times very limited and even dis- 
appearing entirely. 
That mass of black slates, with lenticular masses of lime- 
stone, can be divided, on paheontological ground, into two 
parts, the lower one containing at Pointe Levis quite a large 
number of primordial fossils belonging to the following gen- 
era : Dikelocephnlus, GonocephaUtes [Ptychoparia),Menoceph- 
alus, Agnostas and Jfefoptuma, mixed with special forms of 
marine animals entirely unknown in the typical second fauna 
of the state of New York and Canada, namely : Bathyurus, 
BafhyureUiis, Reniopleuriles ; and finally a certain number of 
forms which developed fully during the second fauna, and 
are found in the Taconic black slates, only in a sporadic 
state, being alwaj^s rather rare, such as lUreniis, Ampy.i\ 
Cheirurus, Asaphiis, Amphion and Harpes. Brachiopoda, 
Gasteropoda and Cephalopoda, as well as graptolites are also 
numerous at different levels of that group of strata; but the 
species are generally confined to the Upper Taconic, and only 
very few of them' pass into the rocks of the second fauna 
proper or Champlain system (Lower Silurian of some or Or- 
dovician of others). In fact, we have in America the same 
