and Paleontology of Victoria. 197 
localities furnishes much additional interesting information. 
Thus the Phyllotheca australis is found with the Glossopteris 
Browniana in the New-South-Wales coal-beds of the Hunter 
River ; so that, although the latter plant has not yet been found 
in Victoria, it is by this association brought to bear on our beds. 
Then, again, I have found the Teniopteris Daintret associated in 
New Zealand with a new species of Camptopteris (C. Nove Zea- 
landia, M‘Coy) ; and thus by this association we get yet another 
Mesozoic genus of plants to support the view of the Mesozoic 
age of the Victorian coal. Besides these generic forms, so un- 
like those of Paleozoic coal, there are numerous species of 
Pecopteris, Neuropteris, Sphenopteris, and other genera having a 
greater range in time, and, as generic forms, therefore, of no 
interest in the discussion of the age of our coal-beds; but the 
species are generally nearly related to the Burdwan and Raj- 
mahal coal-beds in India, and the Scarborough ones in the 
Oolitic series of England. One of these, found commonly near 
Bellerine (the Pecopteris australis), I have recently compared 
carefully with specimens of the English Oolitic P. Whitbiensis, 
and am convinced that there is no specific character to separate 
the Australian fossil, which at most can only rank as a slight 
variety incapable of definition. The Indian beds of Rajmahal, 
so closely related to the Australian coal-deposits near Sydney, 
are now, I believe, satisfactorily connected with the marine 
Mesozoic beds of that country containing Oolitic Ammonites, 
Belemnites, &c. 
It is worthy of note that the collections illustrative of the 
coal-deposits of New South Wales sent to the Intercolonial 
Exhibition by the Rev. W. B. Clarke and Mr. Keene, having 
been carefully examined by myself in company with Mr. Selwyn, 
entirely fail to give the slightest support to the view of those 
gentlemen that the plant-beds and coal are there Paleozoic, as 
there is no trace of the Sigillaria, Stigmaria, Calamites, &c., 
said to be so abundant. The fish have the facies of Permian or 
Triassic forms rather than of Carboniferous, of which period the 
characteristic abundant forms Psammodus, Cochliodus, Ctenopty- 
chius, Gyracanthus, Rhizodus, &c. are as completely absent as 
the Paleozoic plants in the plant-beds. Both in New South 
_ Wales and Victoria a Lepidodendron occurs, but in beds entirely 
below those we are speaking of. I some years ago determined 
the Oolitic age of some marine fossils, including Pentacrinites, 
Belemnites, Ammonites, &c., which had been sent from New- 
South-Wales localities to Mr. Clarke, and by him transmitted 
_ to His Excellency Sir H. Barkly, for my “opinion as to the 
geological epoch to which they belonged.” 
The sandstones of Bacchus Marsh, probably inferior in posi- 
