462 PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION C. 
The system of rocks, which succeed, are all characterised by the 
predominance of Zeniopteris and Thinnfeldia. Near Sydney, this 
system comprises the Wianamatta shales, the Hawkesbury sand- 
stone, and the Narrabeen shales, but it is only in the first-named 
series that coal seams of any thickness are known to occur, and 
none of these are workable. In the Clarence district, however, 
there are several seams belonging to this system, which may be of 
sufficient thickness and of suthciently good quality to be worked 
for local use. The system characterised by Zeniopteris and Thinn- 
feldia in New South Wales is represented in Queensland by the 
Ipswich, Burrum, and Broadsound coalfields, each of which con- 
tains coal seams of workable thickness and quality ; but the coal is 
slightly deficient in cohesive power, as compared with the Paleozoic 
coal of New South Wales. The thickness of these beds in Queens- 
land is probably not less than 5000 feet. In Victoria, similar, 
though probably somewhat newer, Mesozoic coal-measures consti- 
tute the carbonaceous series of Wannon, Cape Otway, and South 
Gippsland. The thickness of these beds was estimated by Selwyn to 
be not less than 5000 feet, and Murray suggests that it may be 
even 20,000 feet. 
The principal seams at present known to occur in this system 
in Victoria are the Mirboo, the Moe, the Bolara, and the 
Kilcunda, the respective thicknesses of the coal in which are 
stated by Murray to be four feet eight inches, two feet to two 
feet eight inches, three feet, and two feet. It is gratifying to 
learn that the Government of Victoria, recognising the great 
importance of the possible coal supplies in the Mesozoic areas in 
Victoria belonging to this system, have intrusted the work of 
making a complete survey of these coalfields to so energetic a 
geologist as Mr. James Stirling, F.G.S., and an exhaustive report 
on this subject may shortly be looked “for from Mr. Stirling, as 
soon as his survey is completed. 
The principal coal seams worked in New Zealand are probably 
much newer than the Mesozoic coal-measures of New South 
Wales, Queensland, or Victoria, and those which occur in the 
coal series are placed by Sir James Hector, F.R.S., at the base 
of the Cretaceo-Tertiary. 
The thick lignite beds of Morwell, in Victoria, and the lignite 
beds of Kiandra and Twofold Bay, in New South Wales, may 
perhaps be homotaxial with part of the coal series of New Zealand. 
The principal seam worked, in this series, in the Nelson District, 
is stated to be from ten feet to forty feet thick, and is a good, 
hard, bituminous coal, resulting, as shown by Hector, from the 
alteration of brown coal by the heat and pressure to which it has 
been subjected in areas disturbed by the instrusion of volcanic 
rocks, as, when traced away from such areas, it passes into an 
ordinary hydrous brown coal. In this paper the author has for 
the most part followed the present classifications proposed by 
