98 THE VICTORIAK NATURALIST. [Vol. XXlV. 



orchid, Glossodia, a Styphelia, and long purple spikes of a 

 Veronica-like plant which was unfamiliar to me. 



We gradually climbed to South IJuchan, where we came on 

 limestones, and a small patch of what I took to be decomposed 

 basalt. The vegetation changed for the better, and fences were 

 once more to be seen. Soon we reached the edge of a great 

 valley, and saw the Buchan River running east to join the Snowy. 

 A steep drop of about 500 feet brought us down to the township 

 of perhaps a dozen houses, widely scattered. 



Buchan is not a Scotch word, but good Australian. Dr. 

 Howitt occasionally spells it Bukkan. It means '' dilly-bag " — 

 the aboriginal lady's reticule. 



The valley of the Buchan River is here about a couple of miles 

 wide. The stream when I saw it was about 4 feet deep and 30 

 yards wide. It was running strongly over a bouldery bed, the 

 boulders consisting chiefly of quartz porphyry and indurated ash, 

 as has been described by Ur. A. W. Howitt. As well as these 

 rocks there were numerous pebbles of blue limestone. 



The Buchan limestone, of Middle Devonian age, overlies the 

 quartz porphyries, which are Lower Devonian, and has been let 

 down by faults, so that it is surrounded by a ring of forest-clad 

 porphyry ranges. The limestone is sparsely timbered and richly 

 grassed. 



It is in this limestone that the caves are found. Limestone is 

 a soluble rock, and the effect of percolating waters is to hollow 

 out underground channels and cavities, and thus the caves are 

 formed. Occasionally the roof of a cave falls in, and a funnel- 

 shaped depression — a " swallow-hole " — -is formed. In some 

 places the swallow-holes are numerous, and many of them open 

 into underground passages. 



The caves are sometimes found opening into swallow-holes, and . 

 at others may be entered through doorways on the hillsides. As 

 is usual in caves in limestone country, the dissolved limestone is 

 frequently redeposited, and stalactites hang from the roof, stalag- 

 mites rise from the floor, while folds of drapery liide the walls. 



The chief object of my visit was to inquire into the truth of 

 statements in the newspapers as to the presence of mammalian 

 bones in the floors of the caves. As a result of the visit a careful 

 search was afterwards made, and an important collection of bones 

 was obtained by the National Museum, but their story I must 

 leave others to tell. 



Part II. — The Caves Twenty Years Ago. By J. H. Harvey. 



The Buchan Caves had been known for some years as well worth 

 visiting, and several attempts had been made to photograph 

 them, but it was not till 1888, in company with Mr. J. Stirling, 



