128 



tested by Mr. G-. W. Goyder, Surveyor- General, and pro- 

 nounced by him to be tin. 



Copper. — Ores of tbis metal most certainly occur, and 

 several applications for mineral claims bad been granted be- 

 tween the years 1861 to 1865, but in all cases the leases were 

 forfeited. The sites of these claims were at Hog Bay, Cape 

 St. Albans, Cuttlefish Bay, three miles south-west of Kmgscote, 

 twelve miles west by south of the mouth of the Cygnet Eiver, 

 and seven miles westerly from Mount MacDonnell. 



Lead. — I have been shown specimens of galena, stated to 

 have come from a large vein situated to the west of Smith's 

 Bay, on the north coast. 



Petroleum. — From a very early period in the history of the 

 occupation of Kangaroo Island there had been known and 

 used a pitch, which was collected upon the south coast ; but it 

 is only through the above-mentioned work of Mr. Tolmer that 

 any of the observed facts have been committed to writiug. He 

 says : — " During my wanderings along the south coast I ob- 

 served numerous fragments of a substance resembling pitch, 

 which was stated to be plentiful, and to be used in lieu of the 

 imported pitch in paying the seams of the vessels and boats 

 built and repaired on the island. Some twenty years after, in 

 1864, I revisited the island, and was conducted to the spot 

 where the petroleum exudes from the fissures in the rocks" 

 (loc. cit. I., p. 320). 



In 1871 coal leases were granted by the Crown Lands De- 

 partment of 10,000 acres each at False Cape and Flour-cask 

 Bay ; and at an earlier period borings were made in the cliff at 

 a point about three miles west from the mouth of the Hog Bay 

 IRiver and at Yivonue Bay — in all these cases with the 

 ostensible object of working the petroleum deposits, which 

 were alleged to exist on this part of the coast, an inference 

 drawn from the presence of pitch fragments on the beach. 

 I have conversed with several islanders as to the place and 

 mode of occurrence of the substance, and have moreover 

 inspected the site of one of the above-referred-to bore- 

 holes, and the shore line of Flour-cask Bay. The sub- 

 stance has been picked up at many points along the south 

 coast, chiefly on the western beaches of the bays, and 

 Yivonne Bay in particular was an important repository for it. 

 The opinion as to the exudation of the substance from the 

 rocks on the shore line is most assuredly based on erroneous 

 observation, inasmuch as when thrown up beyond high tide and 

 subjected to a hot sun it would be softened and insinuate itself 

 among the crannies and irregularities of the surface of the 

 caleiterous sand-rock, and would present to the untrained 



