Hill. — On the Kidnapper awl Pohui Conglomerates. 341 



with the topographical features of the district the report is 

 well worth perusal, although at the outset I must confess my 

 inability to assent to some of Mr. McKay's conclusions, more 

 ■especially with respect to his classification of the rocks extend- 

 ing from Cape Kidnappers to Pohui, midway between Napier 

 and Tarawera, including the Nai)ier limestones and what Mr. 

 McKay terms the " Petane clays." 



I am naturally loth to dissent from any of the conclusions 

 arrived at by officers connected with the Geological Survey, 

 <is their much wider experience in field geology gives them an 

 advantage that far outweighs any special knowledge I may 

 possess of the topography and otherwise of this imme- 

 diate district. In the present instance, however, the wide 

 divergence of opinion held by officers who have been con- 

 nected with the Survey from time to time as to the strati- 

 gi'aphical relation to one another of the rocks in question 

 causes me to think that the more light that can be thrown on 

 the subject the sooner will it be possible to harmonize the 

 varying and opposite conclusions of the different observers. 

 Hence the main object of this paper will be to describe and 

 ■correlate as well as I am able the surface-rocks of a district 

 within a specified radius fronr Napier, with the view of show- 

 ing that Mr. McKay's classification, as stated in his report, is 

 untenable. And in order to do this I propose to work back 

 inductively from tlie present plane of denudation, with its 

 mountains, hills, plains, and valleys, to the plane of denuda- 

 tion immediately preceding it, so as to show the stratigraphi- 

 cal sequence of certain rocks that are now classed much older 

 than I think can be warranted by the evidence available, 

 whether stratigraphical or palaBontological. 



The district to v.hich the paper will be limited for descrip- 

 tive puiposes is the area embraced within the Hawke's Bay 

 river-system, and which extends curiously from the 39th to 

 the '10th degree of south latitude — ;that is, from a little to 

 the north of the Mahia Peninsula to a little beyond Bare 

 Island, south of the Kidnappers. These boundary-lines in- 

 clude the v.diole of Hawke's Bay County, a large part of 

 Wairoa County, and small portions of Waipawa and Patangata 

 Counties. 



Along the western boundary of this district the rocks 

 generally are of Palaeozoic or Mesozoie age, the Ruahine 

 mountain-range being composed, in its highest parts, of a 

 compact, fairly coarse, and indurated sandstone, and having a 

 strong likeness to the New Red Sandstone to be found in 

 some of the midland counties of England. Compact grit- 

 stone and pudding-stone are also met with in some places on 

 the range ; but these rocks are comparatively rare, being seen 

 in the upper streams of the Manawatu and Wai^Jawa Rivers, 



