BY R. C. RINGROSE, M.A. 203 
very obscure. At present we are without information as to the 
extent and thickness of the Ipswich coal beds, their extension 
southwards towards the Logan, their relations to the coal beds 
of the Darling Downs and the Burrum. Such a survey is 
much desired by the mining managers and coal owners in the 
Ipswich district, and the probable result would be a very much 
more rapid development of the coal resources of the district. 
But there is also a scientific question of great interest depending 
on the investigation of these beds, namely, the examination of 
their plant and other fossil contents, and so the determination of 
the age of these beds. If this was done, light would at once be 
shed over the question of the position of the Australian coal 
beds in the geological scale, and the relation of the Australian 
series to those of India and Europe. On this question I will 
refer to an address delivered before the British Association last 
year, at Montreal, by Professor W. Blanford, F.R.S., of the 
Indian Geological Survey, in which he refers to the age of the 
Australian coal beds, and the remarkable discrepancies presented 
by the fossils as evidence of this age (see ‘‘ Nature,” vol. xxx., 
No. 775, p. 440). 
It is a matter of regret that there are no proper surveys of many 
of our gold and mineral districts. Mining enterprise is at present 
far in advance of our geological knowledge of the mining 
districts. Many well-known mining fields have been open and 
worked for a number of years in this Colony, and yet the 
public are without geological reports on the nature and structure 
of the fields. I need only mention such well-known mining 
fields as Gympie, the Etheridge, Cloncurry, Ravenswood, 
Palmer, Wide Bay, and others of less importance. In many 
cases the want of knowledge of the existence of minerals has 
led to the alienation of Crown Lands by the Government, and 
by this means valuable mineral lands have been locked up, 
which, otherwise, would have been worked. I have been 
informed that this is the case more particularly in certain por- 
