BY THE REV. J. MILNE CURRAN. 229 



On reaching Peel another route could have been taken. Beyond 

 the village a road leads away to the right through Silurian 

 slate country. This'road joins the Bathurst Limekilns read, which 

 latter can be followed home. At the bridge crossing the Win- 

 burndale, good casts of Brachiopods — Spirifer and Rhynchonella — 

 can be found in the water-worn pebbles of the creek. These have 

 been washed down from the Devonian sandstones that are exten- 

 sively developed up the valley. 



A very good idea of the slate and schist country about Cow 

 Flat can be gained by driving south through Perth, and following 

 the Rockley Road to the top of the first range. Here contorted 

 slate, clay slate and crystalline limestone crop out. A road 

 through Cow Flat to George's Plains railway station leads away to 

 the right. Along this latter road splendid examples of meta- 

 morphosed rocks, slate country and quartz reefs can be seen. 



Basalt is best seen by ascending the Bald Hills at Perth, and 

 then following a track that leads along the hill tops to Bathurst, 

 via the basalt quarries and Poor Man's Hollow. A separate trip 

 should be taken to study the drifts and basalt on the hill over 

 Evans' Plains, and the same rocks at Mount Pleasant. 



The localities of the contact rocks have been already referred to 

 in sufficient detail. 



x. Economic Geology. 



Gold. — There is little prospect of finding payable gold in quantity 

 immediately round Bathurst. It is not probable that it has been 

 derived from the granite. We therefore fall back on the only 

 alternative that it has been drifted from a distance. And the 

 nearest auriferous country whence it could have been derived is 

 too far away to leave any hope of heavy deposits. 



Granite. — For building purposes the granite will hardly ever 

 become a marketable commodity. Even at a depth the felspars 

 are kaolinized and the whole rock suffers from incipient decom- 

 position. True it will take a polish, but I have had an opportunity 

 recently of examining a polished slab of Bathurst granite that had 

 been exposed to the weather for eleven years. Already the laminae 



