408 Transactions. 



between Tertiary and the Quaternary would have been placed between the 

 Wanganuian and the raised-beach deposits. 



So far as New Zealand is concerned, the rocks deposited between the 

 post-Hokonui and Kaikoura deformations are the younger recks. Let us 

 recognize this fact by giving them the descriptive name of Notocene* 

 To avoid all ambiguity, the Notocene embraces all the beds lying with 

 marked unconformity above the Hokonui or so-called Maitai series, includ- 

 ing the Middle Cretaceous beds of the Clarence Valley and the Castlechman 

 of Wanganui, and all the intermediate beds, but excludes the raised beaches 

 and other superficial deposits which lie unconformably on the Castlecliman. 

 Should still older or younger beds than those mentioned, deposited in the 

 periods between the Hokonui and Kaikoura deformations, be subsequently 

 discovered, they should also be included in the Notocene. The use of the 

 term implies no necessary assumption that the beds embraced by it are all 

 conformable or separable into unconformable groups, any more than the 

 use of the term " Tertiary " implies that the Eocene and Miocene are 

 necessarily conformable or unconformable. It also is not intended to imply 

 that the post-Hokonui deformations ceased or the Kaikoura deformations 

 commenced in all parts of New Zealand at the same time. Considered as a 

 period of time, the Notocene is continuous, whether or not the present 

 New Zealand area was wholly a land surface during any part of it, and no 

 marine rocks corresponding to that part of it are accessible. 



IV. New Adjectival Names applicable to the Divisions op the 



Notocene. 



The use of local adjectival stage names for the younger or Tertiary 

 divisions of the Notocene was advocated because of the doubt attaching 

 to direct correlation of these divisions with those of the European Tertiary. 

 Although it appears from the exhaustive analysis of the available collections 

 by Wood (1917) that direct correlations with foreign beds are possible for the 

 older or Cretaceous divisions, a little consideration will show the advisability 

 of local names for these also. Thus the beds below the Amuri limestone in 

 the Amuri Bluff, and Waipara districts are placed in the Senonian, but it is 

 exceedingly unlikely in view of the different diastrophic history of Pacific 

 and Atlantic lands that these beds correlate exactly and completely with 

 the European Senonian. Again, the Cretaceous beds of the Clarence Valley 

 are correlated with the Upper Utatur of India, and by this bridge with 

 the Middle Cretaceous of England. To term these beds in New Zealand 

 " Utatur " would be highly inconvenient. Local names may therefore be 

 applied with advantage. Until further study of these lower beds has been 

 made, unit or stage names for the smaller divisions of the lower Notocene 

 are unnecessary, and only names for larger divisions comparable to groups 

 of stages such as Oamaruian and Wanganuian are at present advisable. 



The Cretaceous beds of north-east Marlborough below the flint-beds 

 are best developed in the Middle Clarence Valley, and may be termed 

 Clarentian. They include coal-beds and marine rocks. The younger 

 Cretaceous beds underlying the Amuri limestone between Kaikoura and 

 Oxford are most fully developed at Amuri Bluff, and there is no previous 

 name which applies to them exactly. Thus Haast's "Amuri Bluff beds ' : 

 included the Amuri limeotone, Hector's " Amuri series " was restricted to 

 the beds below the Black Grit, and Hutton's " Waipara system " included 

 the Amuri limestone. Hutton's name of " Ngarara group " meets the case 



* Greek votos, south ; Kaivos, recent (as in Eocene, &c). 



