PRESIDENT’S ADDRESS. 753 
were much mineralised, and on one, being part of a rib of a much 
larger species of kangaroo than Wacropus Anak ; there were cuts 
and marks, one on either side of one end, cutting off smoothly the 
broken edges of the bone, others on the flat side and one on the 
edge lengthways. 
The cuts and marks had evidently been made with some sharp 
instrument, and the surface of the cuts appeared of the same 
character as the surface of the mineralised bone, but different in 
appearance to the surface of the edge where the bone had been 
broken, apparently by the point of a pick in extracting it. 
However, as this bone was not found by Mr. Hart, but by 
some other person before his visit to the mine, the certainty that 
the cuts and marks upon it were not made after its discovery is 
still wanting. 
The bones were found in a bed of black clay which contains in 
its lower part layers of volcanic ash. This interstratification of 
ash and clay rests partly on unstratified ash with many boulders, 
and partly upon the Silurian rock, and is 238 feet below the sur- 
face, being covered by two separate flows of lava. The black clay 
is part of an old swamp. 
It is much to be regretted that the incised rib was not, as were 
other bones, found in situ by Mr. Hart, because if authenticated 
by the marks having been already made on it when discov ered, it 
would be almost, if not quite, conclusive evidence of the presence of 
man in Australia in the Newer Volcanic Era as the contemporary 
of the now extinct kangaroos. 
There may be added to this evidence the discovery of the crown 
of a human molar by the Jate Mr. Gerard Krefft in the W ellington 
Caves. As to this discovery, Mr. Etheridge, jun.,* says that the 
tooth appears to be completely fossilised, for on comparing it with 
the teeth of the larger marsupials from the Wellington Caves, the 
normal condition is without question similar. Yet its position in 
the cave, and association with the other organic remains entombed 
there, is open to doubt; and as no other human remains have 
been found at Wellington under similar circumstances, its precise 
age must remain uncertain. 
If any reliance may be placed upon aboriginal tradition, the 
affirmative belief in the presence of man in Victoria during the 
Newer Volcanic Era is much strengthened. 
It is said that there was a tradition to the effect that Mount 
Buninyong had at a distant time thrown out fire. 
Mr. Dawsonj7 also reports a tradition among the aborigines of 
the western district of Victoria that fire came Vout of a hill near 
Mortlake, and of ‘‘ stones which their fathers told them had been 
thrown out of the hill by the action of fire.” 
* xv. } x1, p. 101. 
3B 
