LOWER PALEOZOIC. 195 
lieves that it expresses the nearest approximation to the truth 
that can now be formulated. 
In attempting to canvass opinions and to weigh scientific evi- 
dence, when there is so much diversity, the necessity falls upon 
the reporter to rely on his own sense of justice and his appreci- 
ation of the value of scientific fact and testimony, and with these 
criteria for guidance, to reach what seems to him to be a fair 
adjustment of the various opinions. This your reporter has tried 
to do; and while the result may not be that which all will 
approve, yet he is solaced in the midst of such criticism as may 
be made by the reflection that it matters not what other result 
had been arrived at he would still not have escaped, perhaps, an 
equal amount of criticism, and by the reflection that the recom- 
mendations herein embodied are the result of his honest convic- 
tions of the truth after long and painstaking study. 
Professor H. S. Williams, at the Albany meeting of the 
Committee, suggested an important fundamental idea, and one 
which may influence materially the final distribution of terms in 
stratigraphic nomenclature, viz., the adoption of a dual set of 
designations — one set, that referring to the lithological character 
of the rock-masses and based on geographic names, will be liable 
to vary as the strata change from place to place, and the other, 
based on some great and persistent life-characters, shall refer to 
the faunas of those rock-masses and be substantially constant 
over large areas, and perhaps over the world. It is very evident 
that great confusion has resulted in the past, among geologists, 
by confounding these distinctions, and much controversy has 
arisen in attempting to maintain one or the other of these diflPer- 
ent zonal designations. Stratigraphic work has been ignored, or 
at least neglected, by paleontologists, and the practical field 
geologist has been tempted, in some instances, to ignore, if not to 
deny, the assertions of the paleontologist. Instead of this con- 
fusion there should be introduced some new departure. The 
confusion results from a confusion of nomenclature. Faunal 
characters have been made to have the force and the usage of 
stratigraphic designations and have been extended as stratigraphic 
features, over strata where the faunal characters are wanting. 
Again, stratigraphy, based on natural and great lithological dis- 
tinctions, having been defined in one region by its faunal associa- 
tions, is extended over other states by one geologist so far as he 
