200 PROCEEDINGS OP SECTION C. 



schists which form the country rock of the Star Goldfield and 

 Argentine Silverfield. Twelve hundred feet of these have been 

 mapped, including gaps amounting in all to four hundred feet. 

 These beds have yielded an abundant fauna, including several 

 species of Brachiopioda, Lamellibranchiata, Gasteropoda, and 

 Cephalopoda, two species of trilobites, and some corals, crinoids, 

 and Polyzoa, and a flora of which Lepidodendron australe is the 

 most characteristic form. 



The Star formation, as above described, resting unconformably 

 on appai^ently much older strata, and the Dotswood beds, which 

 pass upwards from the Middle Devonian limestone of the Fanning 

 (Burdekin formation) would appear to be distinctly separable. 

 But a recent discovery of fossiliferous beds in the Dotswood Series 

 has proved that the Star and Dotswood beds, although a notable 

 break occurs between them, ai-e part of the same series, the fauna 

 of the two being practically identical. We must seek elsewhere 

 for the leaves inscribed with the history of the period represented 

 by the break, during which in a limited area terrestrial conditions 

 prevailed. 



The Hodgkinson Goldfield consists of at least 21,000 feet of 

 shales, slates, sandstones, greywackes and conglomerates, with a 

 few limestones, all highly inclined, and containing Lepid odendron. 

 The Hodgkinson beds extend all over the Palmer Goldfield. It 

 is possible that the Hodgkinson and Palmer beds may represent 

 part of the missing strata between the Dotswood and Star 

 beds. If this conjecture (for it is little more) should prove 

 correct, the identification of the little disturbed and not at all 

 metamorphosed Star beds with the Hodgkinson beds, which ai'e 

 highly inclined, a good deal altered, and charged with auriferous 

 reefs, shows how little reliance can be placed on mere lithological 

 resemblance. We may awaken to the fact that in judging 

 of the auriferous or metalliferous possibilities of any tract of 

 country, the conditions of disturbance and metamorphism, are at 

 least as much to be taken into account as the geological age. 



Between ' the Middle Devonian Burdekin formation and the 

 Carboniferous Star formation it is evident that there can be no 

 sequence or passage. The apparent passage at the Broken River 

 and Fanning River must be deceptive. 



Mr. C. S. AVilkinson observes* that— " Below the lower marine 

 beds of the Hunter District are beds of shales and sandstones, with 

 several species of Cyclopteris, Knorria, Sigillaria, Stigmaria, 



Lepidodendron, etc They occur near to, and probably in 



association with, beds of marine fossils which have been described 

 as lower carboniferous." These beds (which are particularly 

 well developed in the neighbourhood of Stroud) I believe to be on 

 the same horizon as the Star formation ; but no passage has ever 



* Mines and Mineral Statistics of New South Wales, 1875, p. 132, 



