360 



Notes and Correspondence. 



[April, 



ahead, and he kept calling out, 

 " Hold ; I am so wet, I can hardly 

 walk." 



You know what it is to walk 

 under fern trees laden with rain. 



I will just give you an outline of 

 what I know from my own explora- 

 tions of this vast coal-field. 



I have explored the counties of 

 Camden, Cumberland, Cork, Hunter, 

 Northumberland, and Durham, and 

 find that the New South Wales 

 Coal Basin extends under the whole 

 of them, and a portion or the 

 whole of Gloucester (I have not 

 explored the whole of it), a portion 



of the counties of Brisbane (not 

 Brisbane, Queensland), Phillip, Box- 

 burgh, Westmoreland, and St. Vin- 

 cent, and that the south-easterly and 

 north-easterly side of the coal basin 

 lies partly buried under the Pacific 

 Ocean, and principally washed 

 away, which makes the New South 

 Wales Coal Basin at least 200 miles 

 in length, and probably the same 

 in breadth ; but the breadth can 

 never be ascertained, owing to the 

 easterly side of the basin being in 

 the Pacific Ocean. I know this will 

 interest you. * * * * 



John Mackenzie. 



On the Iron-bearing Deposits of Oxfordshire. By E. Hull, B.A., F.G.S. 



It is not very generally known that 

 there are considerable tracts of iron- 

 bearing deposits in Oxfordshire, 

 which, when this generation shall 

 have passed away, may be the 

 means of converting this rural and 

 quiet district into a second Middles- 

 borough. This we say advisedly, 

 for, with some geographical differ- 

 ences which will occur at once to 

 every mind, the geological and 

 mineral features of the two regions 

 are similar. Middlesborough and 

 Teeside generally, have advantages 

 in their proximity to the coast 

 for export trade ; in being less dis- 

 tant than Oxfordshire from the coal 

 districts, and in having less com- 

 petition with iron ores from the 

 coal districts of the north of Eng- 

 land themselves. For the present, 

 therefore, and for many yeai-s to 

 come, the favoured region of Cleve- 

 land must hold its own ; but it is 

 well to know that when the process 

 of exhaustion in this and other 

 centres of production shall have 

 been completed, other regions are 

 lying in wait to step in and recruit 

 the ranks of trade. 



It is time, however, to come to 

 the subject of the geological age 

 and mineral character of the Ox- 

 fordshire ores. Strictly speaking, 

 there are three iron-bearing forma- 



tions in Oxfordshire, but only one 

 of any importance whatever. The 

 highest of these, in the geological 

 scale, are the silicious ores of the 

 Wealden — or Lower Greensand for- 

 mation (for it is doubtful to which 

 of these groups the beds belong), 

 which are found on the highest 

 parts of Shotover Hill, near Ox- 

 ford. Here there is a considerable 

 quantity of dark silicious ore, ap- 

 parently tolerably rich, and only 

 made use of for building walls and 

 similar work. The limited extent 

 of this rock, and its inaccessible 

 position (speaking commercially), 

 render it of no intrinsic value, 

 and only to be treated with con- 

 sideration from ih.e fact that it con- 

 tains, in some places, a remarkable 

 group of fresh-water shells. 



The next iron-bearing formation 

 in descending order is the Great- 

 Oolite. The basement beds of this 

 formation, when traced from Ox- 

 fordshire into Northamptonshire, 

 are found to become gradually more 

 and more silicious, and eventually 

 merge into the " Northampton 

 sands." These yellowish sands 

 (which stratigraphically represent 

 the Stonesfielcl slate series, a " lower 

 zone of the Great Oolite ") become, 

 in certain places, calcareous ; in 

 others, ferruginous ; and thus pro- 



