PREFACE. 
When looking over the descriptions of the stratigraphic sections of the 
Paleozoic formations of China by Baron Ferdinand von Richthofen [China, 
1882, vol. 2] and their contained Cambrian fossils described by Dr. W. 
Dames [China, 1883, vol. 4, pp. 1-33] from Liau-tung, and Dr. Emanuel 
Kayser [pp. 34-36], I was impressed with the necessity of having the strati- 
graphic sections studied in detail, and extensive collections of fossils made, 
in order that comparisons of value might be instituted between the Cambrian 
sections and faunas of the western portion of North America and the Paleo- 
zoic sections and their contained faunas in eastern Asia. This project was 
held in abeyance for eighteen years, and had it not been for the support of 
the Carnegie Institution of Washington it might not have been consummated. 
Dr. Bailey Willis has given, in the preface of volume 1, part 1, of “Re- 
search in China,’’ 1907, a brief statement of the events that led to the sending 
of an expedition in his charge and the securing of data and collections by him 
and his associate geologist, Mr. Eliot Blackwelder. 
On the return of Messrs. Willis and Blackwelder, I made a preliminary 
study of the Cambrian fossils and submitted to them the results of the study 
bearing on the interpretation of the various geological sections in which the 
fossils occurred. These were included in their description and discussion of 
the stratigraphy of Shan-tung, Shan-si, and Shen-si. Mr. Blackwelder also 
made a rapid reconnaissance of the southwestern portion of the province of 
Liau-tung, Manchuria, and identified certain Cambrian formations, but did 
not find any fossils. 
From the collections made by Baron von Richthofen, it was evident that 
a considerable Cambrian fauna existed in the western part of Liau-tung, so 
I delayed final publication of the description and discussion of the Cambrian 
collections made by Messrs. Willis and Blackwelder, in the hope that material 
could be secured from that region. Learning in the spring of 1909 that Prof. 
Joseph P. Iddings, of the University of Chicago, was about to visit Japan 
and China in connection with his study of eruptive rocks, I induced him to 
visit Manchuria and make a collection of Cambrian fossils for the Smith- 
sonian Institution from the island of Tschang-hsing-tau, east of Niang-niang- 
kung, in the province of Liau-tung. He was so fortunate as to secure the 
services of Li San, Dr. Bailey Willis’s interpreter, who was also a good 
collector, and they obtained a large number of specimens, representing over 
fifty species of invertebrate fossils. 
Wishing to have better illustrations of the species described by Messrs. 
Dames and Kayser for Baron von Richthofen, I wrote to Prof. W. Branco, 
I 
