Formation of Gold Fug gets. 53 



heavy masses should be found at such great distances from 

 any known reef, as nearly all the large nuggets have beeD. 

 Another point which attracts attention is, that they are 

 sometimes found in the sand overlying the gravel, which is 

 quite inexplicable, if they ever were in motion with the rest 

 of the constituents of the drift, which usually have a regular 

 arrangement from top to bottom. First clay, then sand and 

 fine and coarse gravel. 



These objections to the denudation theory are not easily 

 explained away. And then comes the great fact that gold is 

 contained in the iron pyrites which is found in the drifts, 

 assuming the form of roots and branches of trees and also 

 replacing the carbonacious matter of the other drift wood. 

 Every sample of this pyrites that has been examined has 

 been found to contain gold. In some instances in a quan- 

 tity equal to forty or more ounces per ton, and this in 

 samples in which no particles could have collected in crevices 

 or cracks. 



This proves that gold did exist in the meteoric waters 

 which deposited the pyrites in tertiary times. 



Based on these arguments, Mr. Selwyn, some years ago, 

 advanced the hypothesis, "That nuggets may be formed and 

 that particles of gold may increase in size through the depo- 

 sition of gold from the meteoric waters percolating the drifts, 

 which water, during the time of our extensive basaltic 

 eruptions, must have been of a thermal, and probably of a 

 highly saline character, favourable to their carrying gold in 

 solution." 



As Mr. Ulrich points out in his essay on the Mineralogy 

 of Victoria, this view of the character of the meteoric 

 waters in earlier times receives aid from the fact that on our 

 western gold-fields only, where tremendous basaltic eruptions 

 have taken place, all the large nuggets have been found, 

 while on the eastern and northern fields, where basaltic rocks 

 are wanting, or only of very limited extent, the gold is 

 usually fine, and nuggets of more than an ounce in weight 

 very rare. 



That gold does exist in solution in some saline waters of 

 the present day has been proved by several analyses, and Mr. 

 Daintree found gold in solution in water taken from a mine 

 in this colony. 



Further proof of gold having been in solution at a compar- 

 atively recent date, I found when examining the pebbles of 

 the miocene drifts ; they are chiefly quartz, and are coated 



