86 Rev. W. B. Clarke on the New South Wales Coal-Fields. 



that colony as occur in New South Wales, in the Illawarra, or 

 about Maitland on the Hunter River. And from what I per- 

 sonally know, I believe the Gipps Land Upper Palaeozoic Fauna 

 is lower in the series than the beds just alluded to. Mr. Dana 

 considered those Hunter-River beds to be either Carboniferous 

 or Permian. If so, the beds above, including the coal-seam, 

 may range from Permian to Triassic, or even higher. That is 

 what I am willing now to admit, and, further, that it is possible 

 the Wollumbilla rocks may be the equivalents of the Wiana- 

 matta, or upper, division of the New South Wales Cai'boniferous 

 series. 



But this at present is a matter of conjecture. Acknowledging 

 the value of that discovery, and rejoicing to have been able to 

 assist in it, I repeat that, at the present time, we do not know 

 whether it bears or not on the actual subject of the controversy. 



No palaeontologist has yet compared the Queensland Carboni- 

 ferous flora with that of New South Wales or Victoria ; and we 

 have yet to learn the accuracy of the information which I have 

 collected and am now collecting by the aid of observers on the 

 Maranoa and Fitzroy Downs, all of which, however, tends to 

 show that the Wollumbilla " Lower Mesozoic fossils " come 

 from a higher horizon than the Urosthenes- and Glossopteris-beds 

 of Mulubimba. 



Professor M'Coy states that I requested him to tc determine 

 the geological epoch to which the Wollumbilla fossils belong." 

 T have never, in the recent controversy respecting the Coal-fields, 

 done otherwise than request his determinations of fossils, think- 

 ing it due to him to lay all fresh information before him, and 

 being willing to defer in palceontological questions to his judg- 

 ment. But I retain to myself the right of forming an opinion 

 as to the structure of a country with which I am familiar, and 

 which he has never seen. 



It is under this consideration that I now demur to the admis- 

 sion of inferences from the palaeontology of distinct and widely 

 separated districts without regard to the order or succession of 

 deposits. 



In conclusion, I think that I do not act otherwise than con- 

 sistently in considering the question still an open question ; and 

 though much has been done to reconcile apparent differences, 

 much more remains to be done before any dogmatic opinions 

 ought to be proclaimed. 



I have the honour to be, Gentlemen, 



Your obedient servant, 



W. B. Clarke. 



St. Leonard's, New South Wales, 

 April 26, 1862. 



