344< Sir li. I. IMurchisou on the Silurian Rocks of Cornwall. 



the eastern shores of Austraha, I specially insisted upon its stri- 

 king resemblances to the Ural mountains, whether in direction, 

 in structure, or in alluvia ; remarking, by the way, that as yet 

 no gold had been found in this alhuium. I now learn, however, 

 that tine specimens of gold have been found on the western flank 

 of the Australian cordillera, particularly at the settlement of 

 Bathurst, where it occurs in fragments composed of the same 

 matrix (viz. quartz rock) as in the Ural. My friend and asso- 

 ciate in the Imperial Academy of Petersburg, Colonel Helmersen, 

 has also recently suggested, that a careful search for gold ore in 

 the Australian detritus will, it is highly probable, lead to its de- 

 tection in abundance ; since the Russians had long colonized the 

 Ural mountains, and had for many years worked mines of mag- 

 netic iron and copper in solid rocks, before the neglected shingle, 

 gravel and sand, on the slopes of their hills and in their valleys, 

 were found to be auriferous. If, then, in the course of your 

 statistical inquiries, you may know of any good Cornish miner 

 about to seek his fortune in Australia, be pleased to tell him to 

 apply his knowledge of the mode of extracting tin ore from his 

 own gravel to the drift and debris on the flanks of the great 

 north and south chain of Australia*, or any smaller parallel 

 ridges of that vast country ; for great would be my pleasure to 

 learn, that through the application of Cornish skill, such regions 

 should be converted into a British " El Dorado." 



Requesting you to pardon this little digression, Avhich after 

 all may be turned to ])roflt, and hoping that you will be as jjroud 

 as I am of the connexion which is now established between Corn- 

 wall and Siluria, 



Believe me to be, my dear Sir Charles, 

 Yours most faithfully, 



R. I. MURCHISON, 



* The }^rand, rich and well-watered region which lies between Moreton 

 Bay on the south and the Gulf of Carpentaria on the north, is that to which 

 I would specially direct attention, now tiiat its true characters have been 

 opened out to geographers and naturalists by the undaunted and able 

 explorations of Dr. Leichhavdt. Some of the tracts recently passed through 

 with so much zeal, by the Surveyor-General of the colony, Sir Thomas 

 Mitchell, may also prove valuable in gold, though they lie further from the 

 axis of elevation. In the mean time, gold ore has been found on the other 

 side of the Australian continent, in the ridges which extend northwards 

 from Adelaide towards the scene of the adventurous and toilsome journey of 

 Major Sturt. These gallar.t geographers, the pioneers of civilization, are 

 explaining to us the condition of tracts which thousands of our countrymen 

 may soon colonize with the best cftccts. — London, April 12,1817.-11. f. M. 



