Art. IV. — The Geoloi/i/ of the Loiver Leiglt Valley. 

 By JOHN DENNANT, F.G.S., F.C.S, 



AND 



J. F. MULDER. 



[Eead 14th July, 1898.] 

 (With Plates V. and VI.). 



The River Leigh, or Yarrowee a.s it is soinetinies called, rises, 

 ia the Dividing Range, and after a generally south course 

 empties itself into the Barwon River at Inverleigh. Though 

 only a moderate-sized stream, it has for many miles of its course 

 cut a wide and deep gorge in the face of the country. In places, 

 extensive flats are enclosed between the opposite banks, as, for 

 example, that on which the small township of Shelford stands, 

 and another near Dog Island, higher up the river. 



We shall confine our description of the geological features of 

 the gorge to the lower part of the river, namely, from Reid's 

 Creek on the north to Inverleigh on the south. The country 

 intersected by the river from Dog Island northwards to a point 

 a little west of McQuinn's Creek was geologically surveyed, 

 mapped, and reported upon by Messrs. Etheridge and Murray in 

 1867-8.^ A small portion of the mapped area, viz., from Dog 

 Island to Reid's Creek is remarked upon by us, as it includes an 

 important eocene section. The actual boundary of the eocene 

 is some distance beyond, but as, judging from the Survey's 

 report, the few remaining outcrops are comparatively unin- 

 teresting, we did not visit them. Previous notices of the 

 unmapped area to the south are, we believe, confined to two 

 papers by ourselves, one on eocene and the other on miocene 

 rocks in the vicinity of Shelford.^ In the first of these a list of 

 the fossil contents of the Red Bluff section was included, but the 

 number of species known from that bed has since been much 



1 Quarter-sheet 26 S.E. and Progress Report, No. II. 



2 Geelonsf Naturalist, Sept., 1894 ; Trans. R. S. Vic, 



