GLACIAL DEPOSITS OF BACCHUS MARSH. 387 



Stones." This is just so, and is the result of weathering of the 

 same sandstones, " talus," like other beds. " In the small quarry 

 the dip is E.S.E. about 35°. The glacial conglomerate can here 

 be seen in section resting on the sandstone to a depth of about 

 5ft. This is practically correct; but here again, while they rest 

 071 the sandstones with a dip of 35° other beds of similar sand- 

 stones in turn rest on them, and they are all conformable. 



" Just below the quarry there is another section at right angles 

 to the former. Here an accumulation of rough, angular, and 

 rounded blocks, up to 2ft. in diameter, is embedded in a loamy 

 matrix oA^erlying soft, stratified clays and shales." Here " angular 

 blocks of sandstone in every conceivable position were mixed up 

 in the ruin," which they consider is proof of the action of a glacier. 

 But this is more probably due to weathering, erosion by waters 

 coming down the hillside, and refilling by talus, and is a very 

 small result to have required a glacier to effect. There is, how- 

 ever, not far from this a stratum of the sandstone, which appears 

 to have been much disturbed as though by some powerful force, 

 and in one of these disturbed places are dropped boulders and 

 stones of various kinds found in the conglomerates above them, 

 one of the granite boulders being nearly 4ft. in diameter, and 

 filling the small indentation, while fragments of the adjacent sand- 

 stones have dropped into the places left by the softer beds which 

 have decomj)osed. 



This is considered in the paper referred to as " evidence that a 

 glacier has passed over the surfaces and injected this material, 

 boulders, and all into this fissure," and that the basalt then pre- 

 served it till now. This is utterly improbable, however. It is far 

 more probable that the force that produced the contortion of the 

 beds close by also produced the small depression in which the 

 large granite boulder is now found, and perhaps dropped it into its 

 place, or both the cavity and its contents may be accounted for 

 by a comparatively small piece of ice, too heavily laden with the 

 boulder and debris in question to float any longer, which sank 

 with its load, and, afterwards melting, left the cavity into which 

 the debris now found about it entered ; wiiile as to the angular 

 blocks of sandstone, these, we think, have almost certainly come 

 down from the sandstone above them, which here rises suddenly 

 and steeply. Mr. R. M. Johnston, F.L.S., addressing the Royal 

 Society of Tasmania, on June 13th of this year, apparently with- 

 out any special or particular knowledge of the local physical 

 difficulties in the way of accepting jNIessrs. Officer and Balfour's 

 conclusions, yet considers them highly improbable, properly sug- 

 gesting that in attempting to account for the irregularities and 

 " dislocations " in these sandstones the eruptive and disturbing 

 forces of the more recently ejected overlying older and newer 

 basalts should not be overlooked, though, in regard to the small 

 angular blocks of sandstone lying near the surface, extending but 



