BY THE EEV. W. B. CLAEKE, M.A., F.G.S., &c. 283 



person in this country to suggest the existence of cannel 

 containing oil, and therefore, I will not now say more on that 

 subject. 



There are oil-bearing shales or carbonaceous deposits behind 

 Mount Kembla, in the Illawarra, from which I selected specimens 

 in the year 1849, and I believe such will be found to exist else- 

 where. These shales do not produce so much oil as the cannel 

 coals, and when used up in the retort appear to be of the character 

 of charcoal. They are, therefore, not so much transmuted as the 

 cannel. At Stony Creek, near Maitland, such cannel also occurs. 

 At Brisbane Water there is a very heavy coal which is supposed 

 to be capable of producing oil, but it appears to contain too much 

 ash. Similarly in the Illawarra, in Tasmania, and in New 

 Caledonia, there are deposits which come nearer than the shales 

 of American Creek to graphite, but have not actually attained to 

 it completely. I have specimens here from all these localities. 



During the geological survey of Trinidad by Mr. Wall and 

 my friend Mr. Sawkins, they concluded that the bitumen of that 

 island is distilled from vegetable bog matter by the mere heat of 

 the sun. 



In Auvergne, however, amidst the extinct craters, bitumen 

 exudes from the soil and concretes the particles of sand sticking 

 to the feet ; this is a specimen of it. In the Danubian province 

 of Boumania, bitumen, solid and liquid, occurs together with 

 rock-oil. In this colony there is a spot where bitumen also 

 appears. It may be useful to examine this selection of specimens 

 from Trinidad, sent to me by Mr. Sawkins during the survey. 



Combustibles may, in some instances, be transmuted without 

 being burnt. The coal seams about Mount Wingan on the Page 

 River have been burning for years, and we see them, as well as 

 some in England, where they have long been on fire, exhibiting 

 similar , appearances to coal seams transmuted by trap. In 



International Exhibition Commissioners at Sydney in 1861. P. 86. The 

 examples quoted were the Cannel (allied to the Bog-head coal) of Mount 

 York, and of Loders' Creek in the Liverpool Range. This is further treated 

 of in a paper by the Author, " On the Oil-bearing Deposits of New South 

 Wales," read before the Geological Society of London, February 1866, in 

 which other localities are mentioned. 



