A R TESIA iX BORES. 057 



It wouia thuss appear that the cretaceous rocks occur nearly 250 miles to tho south of 

 the southermost limit hitliert^o assigned to them, anil the importance of this occurrence, 

 in view of the possibility of their containing artesian water, can hardly he over-estimated! 

 The south-western corner of the Colony is very subject to long-continued droughts, nml 

 tlie advantages to be obtained from supplies of artesian water away fronj tlic river 

 frontages would be very great indeed. 



It may be that these cretaceous rocks are merely an outlying or isolated patch, in 

 which case it is hardly likely that they would contain artesian water, as I am not aware 

 of any Iiigh ground to the eastward, where porous beds come to tlie surface in sucli a 

 way as to form an intake for the rain supplies ; but, on the other liand, it is (juite possible 

 that the area under consideration may be an extension southwards to the great nortliern 

 and north-western cretaceous basin, and, if this be so, the possibilities in regard to its 

 containing artesian water are very great. 



I therefore venture to recommend that, with a view to testing the question, a bore be 

 put down on a travelling stock reserve within the area indicated. 



In a report of later date (olst December, 1894), Mr. Pittman writes 

 as follows upon an area examined lying to the west of tlio Paroo 

 Eiver, bounded on the north by the Queensland border, and on the 

 south by the Hue joining Broken Hill and Wilcannia : — 



Perhaps tlie most important conclusion at which I have arrived is that the artesian 

 basin has probably a much further extension soutliwards than had been previously 

 assigned to it. It has hitherto l^een considered that the southern boundary of tiie cre- 

 taceous basin was formed by a bar, or buried range of paheozoic rocks, stretching west- 

 ward from Cobar, through Wilcannia, to Scropes' Range. At Wilcannia the rocks forming 

 this supposed bar M'ere regarded as Devonian, and this opinion appears to have been 

 formed on lithological evidence only, as there is no record of any Devonian fossils 

 having been found in situ, nor of any geological section in which the relation of these 

 Wilcannia sandstones is described with regard to older sediments. But in my opinion 

 the lithological character of these sandstones points to their being of mesozoic rather 

 than of pakeozoic age, and the small anioiint of geological evidence, that can be obtiiiucd 

 from a surface examination, seems to strengthen that view. Deposits of hard sediments 

 which I observed at certain localities — such as at the west of the Koko range, at Koon- 

 ingberry, at the ^^estern end of Mount Murchison, at the western end of Woyclnigga 

 Lake, at the Sj^rings, and at the northern end of Scropes' Range — may be, and probably 

 are, of Devonian age. They consist of hard, dense, thick bedded quartzites, similar in 

 character to those of Mount Lambie, near Bathurst, showing slicken-sided joints, and, 

 as a rule, lying at a high angle with the horizon. But the rocks at Wilcannia are of a 

 different character. They consist of soft, yellowish, greyish, and whitish grits and sand- 

 stones, frequently containing bands and pockets of kaolin, and lying, as a rule, at a very 

 low angle of inclination. In fact, while one set of rocks shows abundant evidence of both 

 metamorphism and disturbance, the other is remarkably free from signs of either. 



My conclusion in regard to these rocks is that they are probably of upper cretaceous 

 age, and if this be correct it means tliat, instead of the cretaceous basin being cut off on 

 the south by an east and west boundary througli Wilciinnia, there may be a deep channel 

 somewhere between Woychugga Lake and Mount Manara, by which the Artesian Ijasin 

 may have extended far to the southwards, possiljly even under Eocene beds of the Lower 

 Darling of the north western portion of Victoria and part of Soutli Australia to tlie 

 neighbourhood of Mount Gambler, where fresh water has long been known to escape as 

 springs on the sea coast, as was first pointed out by the Rev. Tennison Woods. It is 

 quite possible that this water, however, may be derived from the Eocene beds tiiemselves, 

 and not from underlying cretaceous beds. 



The policy of the Department has not been to confine it?- projiosctl 

 operations to any stated district or area, but to give attention also to 

 the wants of the north-western and northern parts of the Culouy, viz., 



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