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On a visit to Devonshire, in August, 1879, I was conducted, by my friend, Mr. John Edward Lee, F.G.S., of Torquay, to a recently discovered locality at Lower Dunscombe, near Chudleigh, in which large Goniatites occur in considerable numbers in a bed of red limestone. On the slope of a chain of hills, not far from one of the farm-houses belonging to Lord Clifford, there is a ruined quarry, in which a vertical face of limestone is exposed.

A Siberian biogeographic realm with the fauna and flora of a temperate-cool climate, and a Mediterranean realm with the fauna and floras of a tropical-subtropical climate existed in the Northern Hemisphere during all of the Carboniferous. There were no ammonites during the Tournaisian in the Siberian realm and the corals and brachiopods were less varied than in the Mediterranean one. Endemic brachiopod species are typical for the Siberian realm. The Siberian realm included the Verkhoyansk, Kolyma, Taimyr, Tunguska, and Chersk provinces. The Verkhoyansk and Kolyma provinces, with rich faunas, coincided with the shelf of the Kolyma massif and the Siberian platform that was covered by calcareous silt. Verkhoyansk and Kolyma were separated by the Chersk province which had a poor fauna typical of deep-water basins. The Tunguska province differed from the Taimyr province in variety of tournayellids and endothyrids present and in poverty of brachiopods, but is similar to Kuznetsk province in poverty of brachiopods. Only multifacial foraminifers remained among the Visean foraminifers of the Siberian realm. Ozaweinellidae became scarce during the time of Yasnaya'Polyana and Okhoye deposition. Endothyridae became scarce but archaediscids increased during the time of Serpukhov deposition. Corals were represented by impoverished complexes. The Siberian species constitute a large percentage of the brachiopods. During the Visean, the Siberian realm spread over the Omolon, Zaysan-Mongol, and Kazakhstan provinces. During the Serpukhov deposition, the Kolyma and Verkhoyansk provinces joined, and the Chersk province was eliminated as a result of structurally controlled facies changes. At the same time, the Tunguska and Kuznetsk provinces disappeared as a result of the continuing marine regression. In Late Carboniferous (Samodiye-early Bashkirian) time, the Archaediscidae continued to dominate in the seas of the Siberian realm; there were many local species and genera among the brachiopods. The fauna of that time was especially abundant in the Taimyr province, from where an arm of the sea extended south to the seaway in the Ob'-Zaysan geosyncline. East of the Kolyma massif, the Anyuysk province existed. Beginning with Kulom deposition (late Bashkirian), arenaceous foraminifers continued to develop in the seas of the Siberian realm; fusulinids, archaediscids, and other forms were completely absent. The brachiopods were represented mainly by endemic species and genera. The goniatites (including species common with those of Northern America and the Urals) were represented by Siberi n endemic species and genera. The most essential differences at that time took place between the faunas of Verkhoyansk-Kolyma province with its foraminifers, goniatites and brachiopods and Mongol-Okhotsk province where foraminifers and goniatites were absent. Not long before the end of the Carboniferous the goniatites had disappeared from the seas of the Siberian realm. At the same time, most brachiopods had become extinct. In the western part of the Arctic the Barents-Franklinian area had an impoverished fusulinid and goniatite fauna that differed from the faunas in the Mississippian basins of North America. End_of_Article - Last_Page 2513

Synopsis Sudeticeras aff. delepinei Moore is recorded as the first identifiable goniatite obtained from the Mill Hill Marine Band in the Lower Limestone Group in East Fife. Its occurrence strengthens the assigning of the Lower Limestone Group to the P 2 goniatite zone and the Brigantian Stage.

Records the discovery of a goniatite zone in the Yoredale series (lower Carboniferous) at Ingleborough, Northumberland, northeast England. One of the specimens has been identified as Neoglyphioceras cf. spirale from the P 2 horizon; if further specimens are uncovered, they may prove useful in solving the identity of the limestones lying above the Great Scar limestone at Ingleborough.

The Devonian System of Euramerica contains at least 14 transgressive-regressive (T-R) cycles of eustatic origin. These are separated into three groups (or depophases) and from Carboniferous cycles by three prominent regressions. Twelve post-Lochkovian T-R cycles are recognized, and they commonly appear to result from abrupt deepening events followed by prolonged upward shallowing. Deepening events in the western United States (especially Nevada), western Canada, New York, Belgium, and Germany have been dated in the standard conodont zonation and are demonstrably simultaneous in several or all five regions. This synchroneity indicates control by eustatic sea-level fluctuations rather than by local or regional epeirogeny. Facies shifts in shelf sedimentary successions are more reliable indicators of the timing of sea-level fluctuations than are strandline shifts in the cratonic interior, because the latter are more influenced by local epeirogeny. Strandline shifts are most useful in estimating the relative magnitude for sea-level fluctuations. Devonian facies progressions and the three prominent regressions are of a duration and an order of magnitude that could have been caused by episodes of growth and decay of Devonian oceanic ridge systems. The described T-R cycles could have formed in response to mid-plate thermal uplift and submarine volcanism. The latter process may have been a control on small-scale (1–5 m thick), upward-shallowing cycles within the major T-R cycles. Continental glaciation could have been a factor in sea-level fluctuations only in the Famennian and could not have been responsible for the Devonian facies progressions or the numerous T-R cycles. The Frasnian extinctions were apparently cumulative rather than due to a single calamity. Two rapid sea-level rises occurred just before, and one at, the Frasnian-Famennian boundary. It is probable that this series of deepening events reduced the size of shallow-shelf habitats, caused repeated anoxic conditions in basinal areas, and drowned the reef ecosystems that had sustained the immensely diverse Devonian benthos.

In July 1940, Dr. Curt Teichert sent me several specimens of an unusual algal stromatolite found in dull red limestone of the "Upper Goniatite Beds" in Western Australia. Efforts to assign them to some previously described form were unsuccessful, and they therefore are made the basis of a new formgenus and species. Stenophycus gen. nov. Stenos, narrow; phigkos, sea plant Small algal deposits forming closely spaced but distinct columns that are round to elliptical in transverse section. Superficially they resemble the much larger Arcbaeozoon Matthew of the Pre-Cambrian, but consist of more distinct layers and laminae. These are convex upward, with almost uniform curvature from center to margin; many are lenticular with pronounced central thickening. In most columns of which sections can be examined, the basal layer is flat beneath and convex above and rests directly upon the enclosing sediment.

In his communication Dr Lee described in detail a marine fauna discovered by Mr Tait in the Calciferous Sandstone Series of Fife in the year 1905, and partly described in the “ Summary of Progress ” of the Geological Survey for that year. The fossils, found in the nodules embedded in an entomostracan shale closely associated with the so-called “ Dunnet Shale,” consist principally of Cephalopods, accompanied by Gastropods and Lamellibranchs. Of the former, Goniatites are the most abundant, and are exceptionally well preserved; the genus Glyphioceras is represented by Glyph. truncatum, Glyph. micronotum, Glyph. subtruncatum , and by specimens which may perhaps prove to belong to two undescribed species. The genus Dimorphoceras is represented by Dimorph. gilbertsoni , a new record for Fife. These fossils, and others which were exhibited, indicate that this horizon of the Calciferous Sandstone Series belongs to the “ Visean ” division of the Carboniferous Limestone.

The diagnosis of the radiolarian suborder Albaillellaria is emended, and a new family, the Ceratoikiscidae, is erected. Four new species of Ceratoikiscum are described from calcareous concretions in Carboniferous (Namurian) goniatite bands of Staffordshire and Derbyshire, England. These species differ considerably from Devonian forms of the genus, and there is a suggestion of a minor change in the Ceratoikiscum species within the Arnsbergian (E2) Stage of the Namurian. Namurian Radiolaria of the genus Ceratoikiscum from Staffordshire and Derbyshire, England

The stratigraphical succession of the Dinantian and Namurian rocks in an area east and south-east of Leek is described. New terms (Mixon Limestones-with-Shales, Hamps Shales, Morredge Sandstones Cloughmeadow Mudstones, Shirley Hollow Sandstones and Harston Grit) are introduced for parts of the succession which have not previously been described in detail. The restriction of the use of the term Churnet Shales by Hudson is discussed and is considered to have been unjustified. Within the area facies changes are shown to occur in the Upper Dinantian (Onecote Sandstones) and in the Namurian. Numerous new fossiliferous outcrops are recorded and faunal lists are given. Goniatite faunas collected from many of these localities permit a more detailed zoning of the strata of this area than has hitherto been possible. Because of poor exposure and the type of facies present the faunal succession is incomplete, but it is probable that there is a complete stratigraphical succession in the area from Upper Dinantian (P1) times to the end of the Namurian.

A REMARKABLE collection of about 400 specimens of phyllocarid crustaceans was made in 1963 by H. A. Toombs of the British Museum (Natural History), and K. Buller and E. Car of the Western Australian Museum. The material was collected at two localities from calcareous siltstone concretions in the Gogo Formation which yields a lower Manticoceras Zone (Timanites angustus Subzone) goniatite fauna of Frasnian 1α age, Upper Devonian1–3. The localities are: 1, Virgin Bore area, Gogo Station, 125° 54′ E., 18° 35′ S., and 2, Bugle Gap, 126° 02′ 15″ E., 18° 41′ S., both in the Fitzroy Basin, Kimberley Division of Western Australia. Preliminary identifications of the phyllocarids, together with the relative frequency of occurrence, are as follows: Locality 1: Montecaris lehmanni Jux, abundant; Montecaris sp. nov. ?, a very rare, heavily tuberculate form; Concavicaris sp. nov. 1 aff. C. elytroides (Meek), rare; Schugurocaris sp., rare. Locality 2: Concavicaris spp. nov. 1 and 2, Schugurocaris sp.

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Samples from 13 stratigraphic sections in Oklahoma, Texas, Utah, and Nevada were studied in conjunction with an investigation of conodonts in Late Mississippian (Chesterian) and Early Pennsylvanian (Morrowan) strata in the western United States. The formations studied include the Barnett, Chainman, Indian Springs, Soapstone and Pitkin, which are entirely or in part Chesterian in age, and the Marble Falls, Bird Spring, Ely, Moleen, Round Valley, Hale and Bloyd Formations, which are entirely or in part Morrowan in age. Data pertaining to the placement of the Mississippian-Pennsylvanian and lower and upper Carboniferous boundaries are reviewed; it is concluded that the Mississippian-Pennsylvanian boundary, based on the occurrence of the conodont genus Rhachistognathus, occurs within the lower part of the western European Homoceras (H1) Goniatite Zone. Several broadly occurring but seemingly thin conodont biostratigraphic zones believed to be useful for intercontinental correlations are established for Late Mississippian (Chesterian) and Early Pennsylvanian (Morrowan) rocks. These are: (1) the Rhachistognathus Zone, believed to be essentially equivalent to the Homoceras (H1 and H2) Goniatite Zone, and which falls in strata of both Chesterian (Late Mississippian) and Morrowan (Early Pennsylvanian) age; (2) the Streptognathodus expansus-S. suberectus Zone, believed to be equivalent to the upper part of the G1 and possibly to the lower part of the G2 goniatite zones; (3) the Idiognathodus humerus-1. sinuosis Zone, believed to be equivalent to the lower part of the G2 Goniatite Zone; and (4) the Streptognathodus parvus-Adetognathus spathus Zone, believed to be equivalent to the upper part of the G2 Goniatite Zone. The latter three zones occur in strata of middle to late Morrowan age. The Kladognathodus-Gavusgnathus naviculus Zone, the Adetognathus unicornis Zone, the Gnathodus girtyi simplex Zone, the “Idiognathoides” aff. “I.” nodulifera and /or “Streptognathodus” noduliferus-ldiognathoides convexa zones (= Declinognathodus noduliferus Zone of this paper) and “Gnathodus” basslen zones, established by earlier authors, are all or in part recognized in the western United States.