702 REPORT — 1884. 



2. Lower Coal-Measures with Marine Beds. — The following plants are 

 recorded : — 



Cycadeace^:. — Noeggerathiopsis, 1 sp. 



Filtces. — Glossopteris, 4. 



EQElsETACKaE. — Annularia, 1 ; Phyllotheca, 1. 



In the marine heds, which are interstratified, are found Lower Carboniferous 

 (Mountain Limestone) marine fossils in abundance, such as Orthoceras, Spirifer, 

 Fenestella, Conularia, &c. The plants belong to forms declared to be typically 

 Jurassic by paleontologists. As the interstratification of the marine and plant- 

 bearinc beds has been repeatedly questioned by palaeontologists, it is necessary to 

 point out that the geological evidence brought forward by Mr. Clarke is of the 

 clearest and most convincing character, that this evidence has been confirmed by 

 all the o-eolocists who are acquainted with the country, and has only been doubted 

 by those who have never been near the place. 



3. Neiocastle Beds. — By all previous observers in the field these had been united 

 to the preceding and the flora declared to be the same. Dr. Feistmantel has, how- 

 ever, pointed out important differences. Unfortunately, as he has been unable to 

 examine the beds, it still remains uncertain whether the distinction, which has been 

 overlooked by all the field geologists, is quite so great as it appears from the lists 

 of fossils given. The following is the flora : — 



Conifers. — Braehyphyllum, 1 sp. 

 Cycadeaceje. — Zeugophyliites, 1 ; Noeggerathiopsis, 3. 



Filices. — Sphenopteris, 4 ; Glossopteris, 8 ; Gangamopteris, 2 ; Caulopteris {?), 1. 

 1 EauiSETACEJi. — Phyllotheca, 1 ; Vertebraria, 1. 



The only animal known from the beds is a heterocercal ganoid fish, Urosthenes 

 australis, a form with Upper Palaeozoic affinities. 



It will be noticed that the difference from the flora of the underlying beds 

 associated with marine strata is chiefly specific, and by no means indicative of 

 o-reat difference of age, though the only species considered as common to the two 

 by Dr. Feistmantel is Glossopteris browniana, found also in the Damuda series of 

 India, in Tonquin, and in South Africa. 



The plant fossils of the Newcastle beds and of the underlying series with 

 marine fossils are those which exhibit so remarkable a similarity to the flora of 

 the Indian lower Gondwanas, and especially to the Damudas. The same genera 

 of plants, especially Noeggerathiopsis, Glossopteris, Phyllotheca, Vertebraria, prevail 

 in both. But the lower beds of Australia, to judge by the marine fauna, are of 

 Lower Carboniferous age, and it is impossible to suppose that the Newcastle beds 

 are of very much later date. They are said to be conformable to the lower beds 

 with marine fossils, and even to pass into them, and they should probably, if the 

 lower beds are Lower Carboniferous, be classed as Middle or Upper Carboniferous. 

 Thus if the evidence of marine faunas be accepted as decisive, the Damuda beds 

 of India are homotaxially related to Jurassic strata in Europe and to Carboniferous 

 in Australia. 



But the Australian Newcastle flora has been quite as positively classed as 

 Jurassic by European paloBO-botanists as that of the Damudas. It would be easy 

 to quote along fist of authorities — McCoy, De Zigno, Saporta, Schimper, Carruthers, 

 and others — in support of the Jurassic age of the Australian beds. For years the 

 testimony of Australian geologists was rejected, and doubts thrown upon their 

 observations. There is, so far as I know, no case in the whole history of pakeon- 

 tology in which the conflict of palseontological evidence has been so remarkably 

 displayed. 



4. Hawkesbury Beds. — The fauna and flora are poor. Only two fish, Clithfolepis 

 qranulatus and Myriolepis clarkei, and one plant, Thinnfeldia odontopteroides, are 

 known, and of the three forms two recur in the Wianamatta beds. 



An important character of the Hawkesbury beds, to which further reference 



