OF NEW SOUTH WALES. 15 



From the Rev. J. B. Tenison- Woods, F.G.S., etc. : On some 

 Australian Tertiary Corals ; Paleontological evidence of 

 Australian Tertiary Formation; Tertiary Deposits of Austra- 

 lia ; Some new Australian Polyzoa ; Census — with brief 

 descriptions of Marine Shells, etc. 



From J. Brazier, Esq. : List of Land Shells — Fitzroy Island. 



From J. W. Taylor, Esq. (the Editor), per Mr. J. Brazier : English 

 Quarterly Journal of Conchology. 



PAPERS READ. 



Note on a species of Therapon found in a dam near Warialda. 

 By William Macleay, F.L.S. 



A few days ago I received from W. R. Campbell, Esq., of 

 Trigamon Station, near Warialda, three specimens of a Percoid 

 Fish of the genus Therapon. 



Mr. Campbell states that they were taken from a dam a long 

 way back from the river, quite unconnected with any water- 

 course, and which had been dry a few months back, and he asks 

 very naturall}'' how did they get there. Instances of a similar 

 kind are not uncommon. I recollect many years ago when the 

 Merool Creek was first occupied by Squatters, that fishes of con- 

 siderable size were found in newly formed dams and in ponds 

 which had been dry for years previously. These reservoirs were, 

 however, all in old watercourses, which had been at a former 

 period well supplied with fish, as the remains of Aboriginal ovens 

 testified, and it was thought probable that the fish so suddenly 

 appearing in these newly formed and filled reservoirs, might have 

 been preserved alive in the moist sand of the bed of the Creek. 

 This supposition might no doubt be correct as far as Merool 

 Creek is concerned, but it certainly cannot account for the fish 

 found in the Warialda Dam, for it is not near a watercourse, and 

 moreover the fish found in it are not of a kind capable of living 

 in moist sand. 



I see no difficulty myself in the far more likely hypothesis that 

 the Ova of the fish are conveyed from one place to another by 

 adhering to the feathers of ducks or other aquatic birds. The 



