On the Epiolitic Rocks of the Venetian Alps

Abstract

Prefatory Remarks by Sir R. I. Murchison .—In communicating, at his own request, this memoir of Professor Catullo, I must be permitted to state, that, with every wish to do him justice, I do not coincide in his views. The allusions I made to Professor Catullo in the Sketch of the Alps and Apennines (Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. vol. v.) referred to opinions maintained by him in 1847 at the Scientific Congress of Venice, and I could not be supposed to be cognizant of his having since adopted the same ideas as his adversaries. The zoological portion of his paper must be left to the consideration of M. Leopold v. Buch and M. de Zigno, who have studied the fossils. On points more immediately touching myself, I need scarcely remind the reader that the Permian Flora is not common to several formations— that the Flysch or Macigno is not the equivalent of the Scaglia; the first being a tertiary, the last a secondary formation. My belief is in no way affected by this memoir, and I now hold, as I did in 1848, that the rocks which Professor Catullo has termed Epi -olitic, when separated from the Neocomian, are simply the representatives of the Oxfordian group. Being unaware of the changes I have introduced since the publication of my ‘Prodromus’†, and within the last three years, you are still‡ under the persuasion, that there is a difference of opinion existing as regards the situation I have assigned to the red ammonitic limestone;