294 Bibliographical Notices. 



congregate. Two tables also show the distribution, in Great Britain 

 and abroad, of the several genera and species ; and a short chapter on 

 the " Distribution and Origin of Species " concludes the volume. 



Geological Observations in South Australia ; principally in the Dis- 

 trict south-east of Adelaide. By the Rev. Julian Edmund 

 Woods, F.G.S., &c. 8vo. Longman, 1862. 



" Every country has its history, not alone the history of what its 

 inhabitants said and did, nor how its people lived, conspired, 

 quarrelled, fought, and died, but a history which stretches further 

 back and is buried in more remote antiquity. If it had not been so, 

 Australia might indeed be counted the youngest as well as the least 

 interesting of continents. She has had no people that could de- 

 scribe her vicissitudes, and there are no monuments left to chronicle 

 her changes ; but yet her history is written in an imperishable record. 

 Of old, when the first explorers came upon the coast of a newly disco- 

 vered territory, the rocks, the trees, the soil, and the verdure only spoke 

 to them of one thing, namely, of fertility, or richness, or special adapta- 

 tion to the wants of man. But now the very coast-line tells much more. 

 Not only is the fertility or barrenness of the place itself told by the 

 rocks, but the explorer is able to guess how far these appearances 

 extend, and whether the country is likely to be fitted for human 

 requirements in the present state of civilization." 



These are our author's preliminary observations in his Chapter II. ; 

 and he follows them up, lstly, by pointing out the evidences of 

 former and different physical conditions presented by the existing 

 geographical features of Australia generally ; 2ndly, by giving in 

 detail an account of the limestone-beds that form the plains of a great 

 part of Southern Australia, and perhaps of Tasmania, describing their 

 probable origin in a sea occupied by reefs of Bryozoa, as some seas 

 now are by corals ; 3rdly, by treating of the extinct volcanos of Mount 

 Gambier and its vicinity, and of their individual and general history ; 

 4thly, by describing the caverns in the limestone of the district 

 under notice, and the undergound drainage in connexion therewith. 



The conclusions that the author draws from his observations on 

 the geology of the colony are as follows : — 



"I. There has been in Australia an immense area of subsidence during 

 the Pliocene period, at a time when Rome, parts of Italy, Vienna, 

 and parts of Austria, Piedmont, and Asia Minor were under the sea. 

 II. This subsidence was accompanied by a [moss-] coral formation, 

 very similar to the subsiding area of the Pacific at the present time ; 

 and although all the appearances are those of a reef of true zoophyte 

 corals, the predominent fossil is a massive Cellepora, while true corals 

 are rare. III. This gives rise to the suspicion that Bryozoa may 

 build reefs and atolls, as well as true Corals. IV. That the sub- 

 sidence ceased ; and probably about that time volcanic disturbance 

 commenced, and gave rise to submarine craters. V. That, after the 

 cooling of the lava from these submarine craters, a deposit of small 

 fragments of shells was thrown down from an ocean-current. VI. 



