for the year 1864. lxv 



land," in which he made known a belt of Silurian (he believed 

 Upper Silurian) rocks extending from Brisbane to near 

 Broad Sound ; the strike of the beds was nearly parallel with 

 the sea coast, and the general dip, at a high angle, was to the 

 North East. The Maryborough and Rockhampton beds were 

 considered to be on about one geological level, but the goldfields 

 of Canoonawere supposed to be older, or lower in the series, as 

 were also the beds extending South West from Maryborough- 

 Mr. Daintree suggested the probable extension of aurifer- 

 ous land between those points. Beds of the same age were 

 also noted at Mount Caroline, Perry's Ranges, Upper Bur- 

 dekin, with a South West dip, representing the gold beds of 

 Peak Downs, and forming the West side of an anticlinal axis, 

 of which the Canoona and Maryborough beds might be the 

 eastern bend. The coast ranges from Broad Sound North 

 to Mount Elliot are composed of granite, and it is only 

 through this rock that the gold drift streams of the district 

 run. A recent Basalt covers the greater part of the country 

 between the 19th and 20th parallels of latitude, having 

 flown from isolated craters ; and this by its decomposition 

 forms a rich soil for pastoral purposes ; while, as in Victoria, 

 the older Basalt is found in dykes cutting through the older 

 rocks. The general geology of the country resembled that 

 of Victoria, except at Fitzroy Downs, where the beds are 

 found containing the Wollombilla Fossils, which I had the 

 pleasure of determining at one of the former meetings of our 

 Society, and so proving, for the first time, the existence of 

 marine Oolitic formations in Australia, from the characters of 

 the Ammonites, Belemnites, and other Molluscs found in them. 

 Mr. Daintree also tried to settle the points in dispute 

 "between the Rev. Mr. Clarke and myself, relative to the 

 age and position of the beds associated with the coal of 

 New South Wales, but failed, from the very spot where 

 sections might have given a definite result being covered up, 



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