UNDERGROnNr) WATERS. 



(With special reference to South Australia and 



Queensland.) 



I. 

 By THOMAS PARKER, F.GS. 



Read before the Royal Society of Queensland^ May 27th, 1913. 



Researches in Great Britain. 

 A GREAT impetus to the study of underground waters 

 — that is. water subterranean, sub-artesian, and artesian 

 — was given by the researches in Great Britain of the 

 British Association for thf3 Advancement of Science. A 

 Research Committee was appointed in 1874, and their 

 work was spread over a number of years. At the com- 

 mencement of that committee's investigations a list of 

 questions was sent out to voluntary observers in different 

 parts of the country. These questions had relation to the 

 wells in their localities, the depths, and yields of water, 

 the variations of the water levels in the wells in dry and 

 wet seasons, and other important points. At an early 

 stage of this inquiry the decision was arrived at that the 

 source of underground waters was the rainfall by percola- 

 tion from the surface. 



XoTES ON South Australia. 

 About this time I was engaged in making engineering 

 surveys in connection with water conservation and irriga- 

 tion in various localities in South Australia. During this 

 work I met some striking instances of the great amount 

 of percolation of the rainfall below^ the surface of the country. 

 In the Willochra Valley, during the great drought of 1885-6 . 

 the ground in many parts was covered with large cracks 

 and fissures, extending down into the subsoil for a con- 

 siderable depth. From this I concluded that, during the 



