A Manual of Elementary Geology / or, The Ancient Changes of the Earth and its Inhabitants as Illustrated by Geological Monuments

by Sir Charles Lyell

Fig. 407.

Brontes flabellifer, Goldf. Eifel; also S. Devon.

Fig. 408.

Restored outline of head of Brontes flabellifer.

For determining the true equivalents of the Devonian group in the Rhenish provinces and adjacent parts of Germany, we are indebted to the labours of Messrs. Sedgwick and Murchison, in 1839, from which it appears that rocks of that age emerge from beneath the coal-field of Westphalia, and are also found in troughs among the Silurian rocks in Nassau. Many of the limestones, particularly those on the river Lahn, are identical, both in structure and in coralline remains, with the beautiful marbles of Babbacombe, Torquay, and Plymouth.

The limestones of the Eifel, long ago celebrated for their fossils, and which lie in a basin supported by Silurian rocks, are found to be referable to the lower part of the Devonian system.