﻿286 Corra^povdence — Mr. R. Etheridge, Jun. 



GOLD IN THE COAL-MEASURES OF NEW SOUTH WALES. 



Sir, — The following important facts, abstracted from a report by 

 my friend Mr. C. S. Wilkinson, F.G.S., Government Geologist of 

 New South Wales, to the Minister of Mines of that Colony, on the 

 occurrence of payable gold in the New South Wales Coal-measnres, 

 may be of interest to your readers. Mr. Wilkinson observed that 

 the gold found in the alluvial deposits of Tertiary age at the Old 

 Tallawang and Clough's Gully diggings was derived from con- 

 glomerates of Coal-measure age, associated with sandstone and 

 shale containing the very characteristic genus of fossil plants, 

 Glossopteris. At Clough's Gully the conglomerate in situ is worked 

 for gold, and has yielded nuggets weighing as much as five ounces. 

 This is the first time that payable gold has been noticed to occur in 

 the New South Wales Coal-measures, although it is to that veteran 

 in Australian geology, the Kev. W. B. Clarke, F.E.S., and the late 

 Sir T. L. Mitchell, Surveyor General of New South Wales, that we 

 are indebted for the first announcement of the fact that gold was to 

 be found in rocks of the age in question.' Mr. Wilkinson also states 

 that a collection of fossil fruits obtained from the " Black Lead," 

 Gulgong, under a stratum of Basalt, and at a depth of 163 feet from 

 the surface, has yielded to the researches of the Baron F. von 

 Miiller, M.D., F.E.S., etc., seven genera and nine species of new 

 forms. The report concludes with a reference to another important, 

 and at present, unique discovery by Mr. Wilkinson, that of a species 

 of Unio in one of the Gulgong "deep leads," "the first fossil shell 

 of the kind yet discovered in the Pliocene Tertiary gold drifts." ^ 



Edinburgh, March 28, 1877. R- Etheridge, Jun. 



NATURAL OR ARTIFICIAL? PITS OF THE HAUTE MARNE. 



Sir,— At p. 210 of Le Bassin de Paris, by M. E. Belgrand, a 

 letter from M. Eoyer is inserted giving the following account of 

 some singular excavations in the Portland Plateaux, Haute Marne. 



" On the high hills of the town of Poissons near Joinville, the 

 culminating point of which reaches the height of 200 metres above 

 the river Kongeant, these cavities, from their depth and extent, 

 acquire unusual importance ; certain of these hills are literally 

 riddled with pits (puits) ramifying in all directions, sometimes 

 Laving a subterranean communication one with another and reaching 

 vmascertained depths, sometimes exceeding 30 or 40 metres. The 

 general character of these pits and the polish of their rocky 

 walls suggest that an acid contained in the waters by which they 

 were eroded, may have contributed to their excavation ; but their 

 extent and number suggest some more powerful agent; and what 

 more powerful cause could you invoke than a great quantity of 

 water, acting through a long period, falling into the fissures of the 

 Portland rock, enlarging them, fashioning them, and giving them 

 the capricious forms which we find everywhere in rocks subjected 



1 Clarke's Southern Goldfields, New South Wales, 1860, pp. 44 and 244. 



2 Sijdney Evemnc) News, No. 2940, Norember 30th ; and Sydney Morning Herald, 

 December 2nd, 1876. 



