PORT S. JULIAN.
(FIGURE 17. SECTION OF THE STRATA EXHIBITED IN THE CLIFFS OF THE NINETY FEET PLAIN AT PORT S. JULIAN.
(Section through beds from top to bottom: A, B, C, D, E, F.))
On the south side of the harbour, Figure 17 gives the nature of the beds seen in the cliffs of the ninety feet plain. Beginning at the top:—
1st, the earthy mass (AA), including the remains of the Macrauchenia, with recent shells on the surface.
Second, the porphyritic shingle (B), which in its lower part is interstratified (owing, I believe, to redisposition during denudation) with the white pumiceous mudstone.
Third, this white mudstone, about twenty feet in thickness, and divided into two varieties (C and D), both closely resembling the lower, fine- grained, more unctuous and compact kind at Port Desire; and, as at that place, including much selenite.
Fourth, a fossiliferous mass, divided into three main beds, of which the uppermost is thin, and consists of ferruginous sandstone, with many shells of the great oyster and Pecten Paranensis; the middle bed (E) is a yellowish earthy sandstone abounding with Scutellae; and the lowest bed (F) is an indurated, greenish, sandy clay, including large concretions of calcareous sandstone, many shells of the great oyster, and in parts almost made up of fragments of Balanidae. Out of these three beds, I procured the following twelve species, of which the two first were exceedingly numerous in individuals, as were the Terebratulae and Turritellae in certain layers:—
1. Ostrea Patagonica, d’Orbigny, “Voyage, Pal.” (also at St. Fe, and whole coast of Patagonia). 2. Pecten Paranensis, d’Orbigny, “Voyage, Pal.” (St. Fe, S. Josef, Port Desire). 3. Pecten centralis, G.B. Sowerby (also at Port Desire and S. Cruz). 4. Pecten geminatus, G.B. Sowerby. 5. Terebratula Patagonica, G.B. Sowerby (also S. Josef). 6. Struthiolaria ornata, G.B. Sowerby (also S. Cruz). 7. Fusus Patagonicus, G.B. Sowerby. 8. Fusus Noachinus, G.B. Sowerby. 9. Scalaria rugulosa, G.B. Sowerby. 10. Turritella ambulacrum, G.B. Sowerby (also S. Cruz). 11. Pyrula, cast of, like P. ventricosa of Sowerby, Tank Cat. 12. Balanus varians, G.B. Sowerby. 13. Scutella, differing from the species from Nuevo Gulf.
At the head of the inner harbour of Port S. Julian, the fossiliferous mass is not displayed, and the sea-cliffs from the water’s edge to a height of between one and two hundred feet are formed of the white pumiceous mudstone, which here includes innumerable, far-extended, sometimes horizontal, sometimes inclined or vertical laminae of transparent gypsum, often about an inch in thickness. Further inland, with the exception of the superficial gravel, the whole thickness of the truncated hills, which represent a formerly continuous plain 950 feet in height, appears to be formed of this white mudstone: here and there, however, at various heights, thin earthy layers, containing the great oyster, Pecten Paranensis and Turritella ambulacrum, are interstratified; thus showing that the whole mass belongs to the same epoch. I nowhere found even a fragment of a shell actually in the white deposit, and only a single cast of a Turritella. Out of the eighteen microscopic organisms discovered by Ehrenberg in the specimens from this place, ten are common to the same deposit at Port Desire. I may add that specimens of this white mudstone, with the same identical characters were brought me from two points,—one twenty miles north of S. Julian, where a wide gravel-capped plain, 350 feet in height, is thus composed; and the other forty miles south of S. Julian, where, on the old charts, the cliffs are marked as “Chalk Hills.”