360 PKOCEEDINGS OF SECTION E, 



described. This was also heard by James Traiuor, whom I had 

 left camped at a hut about 14 miles to the southward. He heard 

 the noise, and thought it was thunder, but on going out of the 

 hut saw nothing but a clear starlit sky. This meteor was seen 

 from the railway line between Quorn and Beltana. 



" On both occasions referred to the sky was perfectly clear and 

 the weather calm." 



The Government Geologist of Tasmania, Mr. W. H. Twelve- 

 trees, in 1904, stated — " The sounds are occasionally heard in dif- 

 ferent parts of Tasmania. At the northern foot of the Western 

 Tiers they have been heard, and rather absurdly attributed to 

 blasting at Mt. Lyell mines, at the w^estern part of the island. 

 Miss Maclean, who resides on Clarke Island, in the Straits, has 

 told me that they are often heard there in still weather, day and 

 r.iglit, and that they always appear to come from the direction 

 of Cape Barren Island, further to the east; hence they call them 

 Cape Barren guns. The sound is like the booming of distant 

 cannon, and seems to come from the horizon. Once they thought 

 it was a ship firing distress signals. I heard them last May (1903) 

 on the west bank of the River Tamar in the forenoon on a cloud- 

 less, calm day. The sound was that of artillery in the distance 

 firing minute guns, and came from the west, the direction of the 

 Inll ranges, or rather from behind the ranges. It was repeated 

 at intervals for several minutes. The previous night, between 

 9 and 10 o'clock, these sounds were heard for half-an-hour at a 

 time, and the following night also. This was about 17 miles 

 north of Launceston, and 50 feet above sea level. In December, 

 1899, I heard the same sounds twice repeated when I was on the 

 top of Mount Victoria, in the north-east of the island, 4,000 feet 

 above the sea level. 



' ' The residents of Tamar tell me that the sounds are heard 

 frequently." 



The captain of the Victoria Tower Gold Mining Company, at 

 Wadnaminga, Mr. F. D. Johnston, reported to the Royal Society 

 of South Australia his observations during the years 1888 and 

 1889 at Gill's Bluff, Flinders Range (see Trans. Roy. Soc. S. Aust., 

 Vol. XII, p. 157). He compared the sounds with those of blowing 

 off steam from a large boiler. Captain Johnston, when referring 

 io slight rumbling sounds at 8 p.m. on the 21st November, 1888, 

 said, " Visiting Mount Rose a few days afterwards,* I found that 

 a very loud rumbling had been heard by John McCleish at the 

 same time. Thinking a storm was approaching, McCleish rose and 

 questioned the blacks, who were a few yards below him in the 

 Gammon Creek. The natives said, ' That one growl alonga 

 ground.' " This remark evidently shows that the natives con- 

 sidered the noises to be subterranean. McCleish stated that reports 

 similar to mining blasts, followed by dull booming sounds, are 

 noticeable every week in the vicinity of Gammon Range. 



