546 Transactions. — Geology. 



Many large masses of the rusty-brown fossiliferous cal- 

 careous sandstone which crowns the Mount Donald Range 

 overlooking the railway-line are strewn on the surface both 

 above and below the outcrop of the Weka Pass Stone in the 

 pass in the vicinity of the quarry. I am inclined to think 

 that many of the fossils credited to the Weka Pass Stone were 

 in reality obtained from these masses. 



Sir Julius von Haast, :;: in his report on the geology of 

 Waipara district in 1869, gives a list of fossils purporting to 

 come from the Weka Pass Stone, and then further on admits 

 that the greater part of the fossils came from the Curiosity 

 Shop beds. The species he enumerates are the fossils cha- 

 racteristic of the Mount Brown beds. Nearly all of them are 

 present at Mount Donald, and can be collected from the 

 loose fallen masses lying in Weka Pass, near the railway- 

 line. Certainly none of them occur in the Weka Pass Stone. 



The Weka Pass Stone has been correlated by the Geo- 

 logical Survey with the Oamaru Stonet for more than thirty 

 years, and the characteristic fossils of the Oamaru Stone have 

 been credited to Weka Pass Stone. I can find no record of 

 the grounds upon which this correlation was made. It cer- 

 tainly was not founded upon similarity of fossil contents, or 

 even lithological characters. 



The Oamaru Stone is underlain by beds containing a 

 Tertiary fauna ; the Weka Pass Stone by beds containing a 

 purely Secondary fauna. Further, the Tertiary fauna found 

 below the Oamaru Stone in North Otago and South Canter- 

 bury occurs above the Weka Pass Stone in the Weka Pass, 

 thus proving in the most conclusive manner that the Waitaki 

 Stone cannot be the equivalent of the Weka Pass Stone. The 

 correlation was apparently based upon the resemblance of the 

 escarpments and weathered outcrops of the two rocks. It 

 gave an erroneous conception of the relationship existing 

 between our Tertiary and Upper Secondaries, and may be 

 held chiefly responsible for the Cretaceo-Tertiary theory of the 

 Geological Survey.] 



Captain Hutton contends that there is an unconformity 

 between the Weka Pass Stone and the Amuri limestone. I 

 carefully examined the line of contact of the two rocks, but 

 was unable to find any evidence of unconformity ; and on this 

 point my view coincides with that of Sir James Hector, Sir 

 Julius von Haast, and Mr. McKay. 



* Haast, Reports of Geol. Expls., 1870-71, p. 13. 



t The Geological Survey has always been of the belief that there is 

 only one limestone in the Oamaru district. The Oamaru or Ototara 

 Stone of the Survey refers in nearly all cases to the Waitaki Stone, or 

 closing member of the Oamaru series, and not to tbe Oamaru building- 

 stone. 



| Hector, Reports of Geol. Survey, 1866-67, p. 17. 



