Fleiitij River and Andersons Creel-. 155 



the flow of the newer basalt, states that " the lava streams 

 extend to the east into the Plenty valley ; thence southward 

 down a narrow valley in the silurian rocks west of the present 

 Plenty River, joining the man basaltic area south of Morang. 

 . . . The width of the old valleys here seems quite out of 

 proportion to the streams which flow down them ; the Plenty 

 River old valley is represented by a strip of basalt scarcely a 

 mile wide, while on the other side of the Morang Hills the 

 Darebin and Merri occupy a basaltic plain seven miles wide. 

 The Plenty and all its tributaries that meet the basalt show 

 extensive alluvial deposits above it, as if their flow had been 

 checked : and it seems probable that all these tributaries for- 

 merly 2:)assed to the west of the Morang Hills, and perhaps the 

 Plenty itself turned in the same direction." ^ 



The hills referred to l)y Mr. Hart as tlie Morang Hills form the 

 elevated silurian inlier with granite intrusions, shown on Quarter 

 Sheet 2 N.E. Mr. Hart recognises the effect of the basaltic flow in 

 largely blotting out the old valley, and in the formation of exten- 

 sive alluvial deposits farther up stream, but his opinion as to the 

 old course of the Plenty is not clear. His reference to the old 

 Plenty valley, represented by a strip of basalt scarcely a mile 

 wide, would fix the valley between the Morang Hills on the 

 west, and the silurian rocks to the east of the present stream 

 on the east ; but he also thought it probable that all the tribu- 

 taries of the Plenty formerly passed to the west of the Morang 

 Hills, and that perhaps the Plenty itself turned in the same 

 direction. In dealing with such a wide area as is covered in his 

 paper, Mr. Hart's remarks as to the Plenty were necessarily 

 condensed. From a recent correspondence with him I gather 

 that he inclined to the opinion that the Plenty at the time of 

 the newer basalt flow ran north-west of the Morang Hills, a 

 course which he considers would be explicable as a result of 

 capture of an old south-flowing stream by a tributary of the 

 Merri, though at the time he did not deal with this earlier 

 history of the Plenty. 



Prof. Gregory in his Geography of Victoria (1903) states"^ 

 that the Plenty flows south through a broad mature valley, 



1 lb., p. 77. 



2 p. 112. 



