142 PROCEEDINGS OF THE GEOLOGICAL society. [Noyv. 17. 
NoveMBER 17, 1847. 
Amos Beardsley, Esq., was elected a Fellow of the Society. 
The following communications were then read :— 
1. Notes on the Geology of the Coasts of AustRALIA. By 
J. Breere Juxes, Esq., M.A., F.G.S. 
In this memoir Mr. Jukes gave a short abstract of all the informa- 
tion collected by various travellers regarding the Australian continent, 
including his own observations. 
The eastern coast is occupied by a great range of high land, ap- 
pearing like a contmuous chain of mountains when seen from the 
sea, and rising in several places to 5000 feet or more above the sea- 
level. This chain has an axis of granite, with occasional large masses 
of greenstone, basalt and other igneous rocks. It is flanked on both 
sides by thick beds of paleeozoic formations, chiefly sandstone, but 
also contaming limestone and coal. In the northern portion of the 
chain Dr. Leichardt found similar formations, and especially trap 
and granite near the Burdekin river. In the Port Philip district 
there are similar igneous rocks, and on the coast tertiary formations, 
which Mr. Jukes found resting on the edges of upturned paleeozoic 
beds. In West Australia the Darling range consists of granite below, 
covered by metamorphic rocks ; and between it and the sea is a plain 
composed of tertiary beds. In the colony of North Australia there 
is a great sandstone plateau, rising about 1800 feet above the sea, 
and probably of palzeozoic age; whilst on the immediate shore and 
round the Gulf of Carpentaria are beds supposed to belong to the 
tertiary period. Similar formations constitute the substratum of the 
central desert, in which Capt. Sturt was compelled to turn, when 
half-way to the Gulf of Carpentaria, from the southern coast. Hence 
Mr. Jukes conjectures that these tertiary rocks are probably con- 
tinuous through the whole central region, and that during the ter- 
tiary period all this portion of the country was submerged, whilst 
the high lands on the coast rose like four groups of islands from a 
. shallow sea. In confirmation of this view, he remarked that a greater 
difference existed between the plants and animals of New South Wales 
and Western Australia, though in the same latitude, than between 
those at the southern and northern extremities of the eastern chain 
of mountains, distant 20° of latitude from each other. 
2. Remarks to accompany a Geological Map of WESTERN AUSTRA- 
Lia. By Messrs. J. W. Gregory and Francis T. GREGORY. 
In this memoir an account was given of the rocks and minerals ob- 
served in various parts of Western Australia, especially in a section 
from the sea-coast to the summit of the Darling range. Specimens 
of the rocks collected were also exhibited to the Society. 
