Correspondence — Rev. T. G. Bonney. 521 



large caves containing fossil remains have been discovered in the 

 limestone country between Cowra and Canowindra, on the road 

 between these two places, and between 70 and 80 miles from 

 Bathurst. The description of the caverns differs in no wise from 

 those of other limestone districts where 'streams have dissolved more 

 or less extensive chambers in the softer limestone, these chambers 

 being connected by narrow passages, and lying at different elevations 

 with regard to each other. The caverns are large, and decorated 

 with stalactites. The roof of one chamber in the principal cave is 

 said to be from 80 to 90 feet high, with some 12 or 14 openings 

 leading into other cavities. They are stated to descend from 300 to 

 400 feet beneath the surface. Nearly all the caves and chambers 

 have their floors composed of a thick layer of ossiferous breccia 

 apparently quite undisturbed. Only one cave seems to have been 

 dangerous from " choke-damp. ^^ The writers are very enthusiastic 

 as to their discoveries, and propose to explore another cave reached 

 by a shaft 100 ft. perpendicular. We trust that no lives will be 

 lost in this somewhat Quixotic fit of cave-hunting, and shall look 

 forward with interest to Mr. Gerard Krefft's report on the bones 

 from this extensive series of caves and fissures in New South Wales. 

 — Edit. Geol. Mag. 



GLACIAL ORIGIN OP LAKE-BASINS. 



Sir, — I fear the points of difference between Mr. Hugh Miller 

 and myself are hardly such as can be cleared up in the compass of a 

 letter, but yet I should like to make one or two remarks on his 

 paper, because I still think we are to some extent misunderstanding 

 one another. My letter (p. 376) was chiefly devoted to the reason- 

 ing in Mr. Fisher's paper (p. 253) ; the paragraph alluding to Mr. 

 Miller's letter (p. 287) was simply intended to call attention to a 

 defect in his reasoning (where he now admits that he did himself 

 injustice) and to guard against what seemed to me a misconception 

 of my argument. An unfortunate printer's error, or slip in writing in 

 my manuscript (it was not possible for me to revise a proof), made 

 my meaning less clear than it should have been. Expanded, this is 

 what I intended to imply — " Suppose you prove that a certain 

 number of small -sized sheets of water (to avoid ambiguity we will 

 say such as Grasmere, or less) are most easily explained by the h3^po- 

 thesis of glacial erosion, it does not follow that very large and deep 

 sheets of water (such as Como) are most easily explained by the 

 same hypothesis." The first paragraph of Mr. Miller's letter, and 

 parts of the second and third on page 287, appeared to mean that he 

 claimed to reason from the examples which he quoted to those cases 

 which I have always disputed ; and in his paper (p. 453) he seems 

 to still maintain this : "It appears to me that no halting-place can 

 logically be found by those who, with Sir Charles Lyell, allow only 

 some mountain tarns to Prof. Ramsay's demand for lakes." It is this 

 which I dispute. Perhaps the halting-place may not be impregnable 

 to an attack on the destructive ' Sorites ' method ; but in science 

 and in every-day life, we are constantly obliged to take our stand on 



