490 Transactions. — Geology. 



agreement has yet been arrived at upon a subject which is of 

 supreme scientific and economic importance to tbe colony. 



The chief points of disagreement have mainly centred 

 around the stratigraphical position of the beds which contain 

 the Pareora fauna. The views of different writers have in- 

 volved so many points of radical disagreement that it has 

 been impossible for students of New Zealand geology to 

 reconcile the differences. 



In the hope of throwing some light upon this difficult pro- 

 blem I spent two months of the present year in an extended 

 examination of the typical sections throughout North Otago 

 and Canterbury, beginning at Hampden and ending at 

 Waipara. 



As the subject was largely palaeontological I made con- 

 siderable collections of fossils, which, with the exception of 

 the brachiopods, I afterwards named by comparing them with 

 the Tertiary types in the Canterbury Museum, all of which 

 had recently been renamed by Captain Hutton, F.K.S., in 

 accordance with latest nomenclature adopted in Europe. 



The brachiopods in my collections were named by Captain 

 Hutton, who kindly supplied the revised names as they appear 

 in his paper on "The Eevision of the Tertiary Brachiopoda 

 of New Zealand." (See p. 474 of this volume.) 



Altogether over twelve hundred fossils were examined and 

 named. Without the aid of Captain Hutton this would have 

 been a stupendous task ; but the work was rendered com- 

 paratively easy through the unrivalled knowledge which he 

 possesses of our Tertiary Mollusca. 



. HlSTOKICAL. 



The name Pareora was first used in 1864 by Sir Julius von 

 Haast* to designate certain fossiliferous marine beds in the 

 valleys of the Pareora, Opihi, and Otaio Eivers in South 

 Canterbury, as well as the Motanau and Greta beds in North 

 Canterbury. Captain Huttonf subsequently, in his report on 

 the geology of Marlborough and north-east district of Canter- 

 bury, in 1873, introduced the Pareora formation into his table 

 of formations, assigning it at this time to the Upper Miocene. 

 Like Haast, he referred the Motanau and Greta beds to this 

 formation ; but afterwards, in 1888, as the result of a more 

 complete knowledge of the fossil contents of the different 

 beds, he divided the Pareora formation into an upper and 

 lower group, the former including the Greta beds, which con- 

 tained about 60 per cent, of living forms.] 



The Pareora series of Captain Hutton now comprises 



* Haast, " Geology of Canterbury and Westland," 1S7 ( J, p. 323. 

 t Reports of Geol. Explorations, 1872-73, p. 47. 

 \ Trans. N.Z. Inst., vol. xx., 1888, p. 262. 



