558 president's address. 



country is grassy and lightly timbered. The flats, the soil of 

 which is a stiff clay, have much grass and little timber ; the 

 slopes of the hills are covered with a pisolitic iron, quartz sand, 

 gravel ; and as we recede from the swampy ground the grass 

 becomes shorter and scantier, and the trees closer and smaller 



" The timber is of a scrubby kind, the chief constituents being 

 two or three eucalypti (E. clavigera, &c), Iron wood (Erythro- 

 phlcBum Laboucherii), and Grevillea-chrysodendron. There is a 

 general absence of shrubs ; and the grasses, which make up the 

 rest of the landscape, if we except the grotesque anthills, which 

 almost equal in height the trees amongst which they occur, are 

 comprised of about 3 species." 



Regarding the metalliferous country, Professor Tate describes it 

 as consisting of metamorphic rocks, in the midst of which occur 

 granite, diorite, and porphyritic felstones. This tract comprises 

 an area of 7,800 square miles, the boundaries of which are defined 

 by the desert sandstone, which forms bold escarpments about 600 

 feet high, and which is the northern edge of the great plateau of 

 Central Australia. Rich gold-bearing quartz reefs occur in the 

 metamorphic rocks, and the alluvium in the neighbouring gullies 

 has been found to be rich in gold. Ores of tin, copper, lead, and 

 iron have been proved in several localities. Professor Tate is, 

 however, of opinion, that these mineral riches will not be 

 profitably worked by European labour, but that their development 

 must be left to the cheaper and more acclimatised labour of the 

 Asiatic tribes under the management of Europeans. 



In New Zealand considerable activity has, as usual, been mani- 

 fested in matters of Science, chiefly by Dr. Hector, C.M.G., 

 F.P.S. ; Professor Julius von Haast, F.R.S. ; Professor Hutton, 

 F.G.S. ; Professor G. Ulrich, F.G.S. ; Professor Parker and 

 others. Their labours are chiefly made known in the Transactions 

 of the New Zealand Institute, The New Zealand Science Journal, 

 and in the publications of the Colonial Museum and Geological 

 Survey Department ; one of the latter, which may be mentioned 

 as of general interest, is a third edition of the Handbook of New 



