Fox. — The Wai tenia fa Series. 455 



tuffs are comparatively rich in fossils, whereas the sandstones 

 and shales are generally lacking in organic remains. 



2. Previous Observers. 



Hochstetter was the first to describe the Waitemata series, 

 in a lecture delivered to the Auckland Institute in 1859 : 

 " The horizontal beds of sandstone and marl which form the 

 cliffs of the Waitemata and extend in a northerly direction to 

 Kawau belong to a newer Tertiary formation, and, instead of 

 coal, contain only layers of lignite. A characteristic feature 

 of this Auckland Tertiary formation is the existence of beds of 

 volcanic ashes, which are here and there interstratified with 

 the ordinary Tertiary layers."* 



Captain Hutton showed in 1870 that the beds could be 

 followed in an easterly direction to the Hunua and Wairoa 

 Ranges, composed of Palaeozoic slates. He thought that the 

 estuarine sandstones forming the upper part of the series were 

 separated by an unconformability from the greensands and 

 limestone to the east.t 



Mr. S. H. Cox, of the Geological Survey, traced the beds 

 to the north some ten years later. At Komiti Peninsula he 

 found Lower Miocene fossils associated with the forms found 

 in the Orakei Bay greensand. He therefore concluded that 

 the Waitemata series was Lower Miocene.]: 



Sir James Hector. Director of the Geological Survey, 

 thought that the series should be divided at the Parnell 

 grit ; the beds below this he classed as Cretaceo-tertiary, 

 those above it as Lower Miocene. This seems to have been 

 the first occasion when the importance of the Parnell grit as 

 a stratigraphical guide was realised.] 



Mr. McKay, of the Geological Survey, examined the 

 district in 1883. He agreed with Sir James Hector in the 

 division of the series; considered the "Port Britomart " 

 shales the equivalent of the Orakei Bay greensand, and showed 

 the Parnell grit lying unconformably on the former ; and 

 identified the Cheltenham breccia with the Parnell grit on 

 stratigraphical grounds. § 



Captain Hutton, in 1884, showed that there was no evi- 

 dence of an unconformability between the Orakei Bay green- 

 sand and the Parnell grit ; that there was no evidence that 

 the latter was younger than the former ; and that the Orakei 

 Bay bed was of Miocene age. || 



Mr. James Park, of the Geological Survey, made an 



* " Reise der ' Novara ' : Geology," i., p. 34. 

 t Trans. N.Z. Inst., vol. xvii , p. 307. 

 I Geological Reports, 1879-80. 

 § Geological Reports, 1883-84. 

 I Trans. N.Z. Inst. 



