VIII.—Ideal Landscape of the Silurian Period.
On this subject, and on the principles which have guided geologists in their classification of rocks, Professor Sedgwick remarks in one of his papers in the Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society: “In every country,” he says,[36] “which is not made out by reference to a pre-existing type, our first labour is that of determining the physical groups, and establishing their relations by natural sections. The labour next in order is the determination of the fossils found in the successive physical groups; and, as a matter of fact, the natural groups of fossils are generally found to be nearly co-ordinate with the physical groups—each successive group resulting from certain conditions which have modified the distribution of organic types. In the third place comes the collective arrangement of the groups into systems, or groups of a higher order. The establishment of the Silurian system is an admirable example of this whole process. The groups called Caradoc, Wenlock, Ludlow, &c., were physical groups determined by good natural sections. The successive groups of fossils were determined by the sections; and the sections, as the representatives of physical groups, were hardly at all modified by any consideration of the fossils, for these two distinct views of the natural history of such groups led to co-ordinate results. Then followed the collective view of the whole series, and the establishment of a nomenclature. Not only the whole series (considered as a distinct system), but every subordinate group was defined by a geographical name, referring us to a local type within the limits of Siluria; in this respect adopting the principle of grouping and nomenclature applied by W. Smith to our secondary rocks. At the same time, the older slate rocks of Wales (inferior to the system of Siluria), were called Cambrian, and soon afterwards the next great collective group of rocks (superior to the system of Siluria) was called Devonian. In this way was established a perfect congruity of language. It was geographical in principle, and it represented the actual development of all our older rocks, which gave to it its true value and meaning.” The period, then, for the purposes of scientific description, may be divided into three sub-periods—the Upper and Lower Silurian, and the Cambrian.
Fig. 18.—Back of Asaphus caudatus (Dudley, Mus. Stokes), with the eyes well preserved. (Buckland.)
