Dr. P. Marshall — Younger Rock Series of New Zeahiiid. 319 



Puke iwi talii the dip changes to the east, and sliortly afterwards 

 a complete pericline is developed. 



Such changes in the dip and strike show that the rocks are much 

 disturbed, and Avhen the structure of rocks of similar age at Weka 

 Pass is considert-d, it is reasonable to demand an actual junction to 

 establish an unconformity instead of a difference in dip and strike of 

 two rock exposures separated by half a mile of grass- covered country. 

 This distance would allow of tlie intercalation of all the members of 

 the rock series in their proper order ; but even if a structural break 

 be insisted on a fault offers a more reasonable explanation, as has 

 been shown at length by Cox, Hector, and McKay. Northward from 

 Shag Point along the coast, Hector states that no unconformity was 

 discovered: "Thus completing the succession from the lowest" 

 (conglomerates of Shag Point) "to all but the highest beds of the 

 Cretaceo-Tertiary sequence." ' 



At Komiti Point no work has been done since 1886-7, when Professor 

 Park reported on the district. He says: "At the point opposite 

 Batley they" (Komiti Beds — Lower Miocene) " lie on the upturned 

 edges of the chalky clays belonging to the Inoceramus Beds (certainly 

 Jurassic, p. 229), and on the south side of the Otamatea, opposite 

 Batley, they rest on the hydraulic limestone, but whether conformably 

 or not I was unable to decide, as on account of the shattered and 

 jointed condition of the limestone all trace of the original bedding is 

 now obliterated. However ... a certain amount of unconformity 

 may be allowed at this point, but the lapse of time that this un- 

 conformity would represent must be very limited judging from the 

 very close affinities that exist between the fauna of the Komiti Beds 

 and that of the marlj- greensands underlyiug the hydraulic limestone 

 at Pahi." ^ This is the section which twenty-six years later without 

 further description is used to separate the New Zealand Cretaceous 

 from the Miocene, and for the interpretation of the Waipara section 

 600 miles distant, which must "ever remain the typical section for 

 the study of the formations that they represent ".^ 



" The beautiful section near Wade " was not considered of sufficient 

 importance for description when discovered, and has not been described 

 since. It is not even mentioned in Park's Geology of New Zealand. 

 However, all such sections are largely beside the point. It is in the 

 district of North Canterbury that the younger series of rocks is most 

 perfectly developed and displayed, and it is universally agreed that 

 conclusions as to their relationships must be based on the perfect and 

 continuous sections there exposed. 



In conclusion, will you allow me to state most briefly the reasoned 

 conclusions at which we arrived after a stratigraphical study of the 

 younger rocks of New Zealand. 



1 . That there is a single rock series which consists of conglomerates, 

 sandstones, greensands, limestone, greensands, grey marls, and brown 

 sands, which is found in more or less complete development where- 

 ever the rocks are exposed. Necessarily in some places certain 



' Eep. Geol. Explor. of N.Z., 1886-7 ; Progress Report, p. xx. 

 - Ibid., 1886-7, p. 228. 

 ^ Ibid., 1887-8, p. 33. 



