1850.] MANTELL ON THE GEOLOGY OF NEW ZEALAND. 323 



reaches a height of fifteen feet, and, gradually dipping to the south, 

 disappears in the course of a few miles. The country then resumes 

 its former aspect, save that instead of one vast continuous tract of 

 level land, there are small narrow plains intersecting gently-undulating 

 downs. 



" A bed of coal, ten feet in thickness, is said to crop out on the 

 bank of a stream inland of Timaru. Specimens were obtained from 

 this locality by Mr. Torlesse ; it resembled the lignite from Mount 

 Grey, but was more bituminous. 



" Striking from the coast across a plain about four miles wide, 

 forming the north point of the Waitaki valley, we reached Te Mo- 

 rokura. The river, a torrent with a freshet channel half a mile in 

 width, cuts through the gravel of the plain, which in the river-bed is 

 intermingled with basaltic and porphyritic pebbles, brought down 

 from the interior of the country by the stream. On the south side 

 the plain is bounded by the Pukehuri range, a spur from the Southern 

 Alps, about 1000 feet high, composed of highly-inclined strata of slate, 

 covered by a ferruginous conglomerate of quartz pebbles. 



" In Awaamoko, the next transverse guUey west of Waikoura, I 

 observed beds of slate with veins of quartz, dipping south 70° ; but 

 I could not, in my rapid passage, make out the relative position of 

 these slates and the quartz conglomerate in the next valley, east of 

 "Waikoura, by which we left the Waitaki plain. 



"Beyond Morokura the country of Waiareka commences, and 

 strata of a yellow and fawn-coloured limestone appear, and continue 

 to Kakaunui. This limestone is generally friable and porous ; it al- 

 most wholly consists of shells and corals, and contains terebratulee, 

 echinites, a species of pseudo-belemnite, teeth of sharks, &c. A 

 microscopical examination shows that the calcareous cementing ma- 

 terial of the larger shells and corals is made up of Textularise, Ro- 

 talisR, and other common genera of Foraminifera, as will be particu- 

 larized in the sequel. 



" The beds are gently inclined and in various directions ; a section 

 north and south at the low caves at Te Anaamatara, where the last 

 traces of these deposits were visible, showed a slight dip to the north. 



Fig. 2. — Caves in the Limestone at Te Anaamatara. 



Caves. 



" This limestone, both at Ototara and Te Anaamatara, is very ca- 

 vernous ; and two large caves at the former place afforded a comfort- 

 able night's lodging to myself and my companion, Mr. Alfred Wills, 

 and our party ; and it was no small gratification to me to collect from 

 the walls of our cavern the next morning, terebratulse, shark teeth, 

 and other fossils, which, if not identical with, seem closely allied 

 to, those I used to obtain, when a lad, from the chalk near Chi- 

 chester ; and which now seeing again for the first time since I left 

 England nine years ago, appeared like old familiar faces greeting me 

 from the rocks of the Antipodes. 



