Geology of the Lower Yarra. 251 



In the floor of the cutting two small springs were throwing 

 out fine black sand and colorless water having a strong smell of 

 sulphuretted hydrogen. The bubbling of one spring was dis- 

 tinctly audible a few yards away. Down the face of the slope of 

 the bank on the south side there was a considerable percolation 

 of water highly charged with iron, which left yellow, red, and 

 brown deposits of chloride and oxides of iron. This \vas also a 

 noticeable feature in the cutting on the north side and the 

 colorless water which occurred there also was asserted by the 

 workmen to have a poisonous effect on any skin abrasion with 

 which it came into contact. In the portion in the south cutting- 

 nearest the new bridge in Anderson Street, the shells occurred in a 

 distinctly stratified bluish-grey micaceous clay containing remains 

 of reeds, wood, and masses of black vegetable mould without 

 shells, which crumbled to powder on rubbing when dry. The 

 mica has probably been derived from some dyke containing that 

 mineral. A dyke of a granitic nature must occur somewhere in 

 the vicinity, as rock of that kind was noticed in the material 

 used for making the embankment on the Botanical Gardens side 

 of the cutting, and this material was said by one of the woi-kmen 

 to have come from about the southern abutment of the bridge. 



The similarity of these mineral water exudations from the 

 sides of the cuttings to those described by Mr. Lucas from the 

 Fishermen's Bend cutting is very great, and it is also a notice- 

 able fact that the upper portions of the deposits in both places 

 contained no animal remains of any kind. The nodules, however, 

 so prevalent in the West Melbourne estuarine deposits, were not 

 noticed in these. 



The occurrence of tliese shelly marls so far up such a narrow 

 valley as this of the Yarra is a feature of especial interest, more 

 so on account of the narrow entrance to it at Prince's Bridge. 

 There seems little doubt that this estuai'ine deposit under 

 alluvium, as in the locality under notice, extends. over a consider- 

 able portion of South Melbourne, and that the old course of the 

 Yarra was to the S.W. through what is now Albert Park Lake 

 running into Port Phillip somewhere between Albert Park and 

 St. Kilda Railway Stations. 



On the evidence furnished by these Yarra sections it appears 

 as if the estuarine deposits may be provisionally regarded as 



