Canterbury and Westland. 269 



may point out that the same objection was made to the G-lossopteris in 

 Australia, which has by overwhelming evidence "been shown to be of 

 palaeozoic age. I do not think that the fragment of a leaf, however 

 distinct, can unsettle all that stratigraphical geology has proved to be 

 correct. * 



There is some difference in the character of these old sedimentary 

 strata, going from east to west. It appears that whilst in the ranges 

 near the plains we generally observe true littoral beds — the deposits of 

 large rivers entering here the palaeozoic sea — further to the west, as 

 for instance, on the banks of the Upper Rangitata, we find their 

 horizontal equivalents as rocks of a different character. They consist 

 of shales and shaly sandstones with marine shells, mostly brachiopods, 

 showing that they were deposited in deeper water than the Clent Hill 

 beds, and some distance from the palaeozoic coast-line. 



In confirmation of my statements, I shall now proceed to give 

 the usual sequence of the lowest sedimentary rocks, as they appear in 

 the Clent Hills district in an ascending order. — (See Section-plate, 

 No. 2, section No. 4.) 



The lowest beds are usually : 



1. Slates greyish, sometimes very siliceous, alternating with sand- 

 stones, the latter gradually becoming of a coarser grain, so as first to 

 assume the character of a grit, and afterwards of a pebble-bed. 



Upon them repose : 



2. Thick bedded conglomerates, in the Clent Hills several hundred 

 feet thick. In these conglomerates occur large sometimes fucoid-like 

 carbonaceous markings, as if from drift trees. Smaller beds 

 of sandstone are interstratified, partly ferruginous, partly full of 

 obscure remains of plants. Well-rolled boulders of greyish or greenish 

 coarse sandstone, from the size of a child's head to that of a bean, 

 form the principal portion of the rocks, mixed sometimes with 

 boulders or pebbles of chert and lydian stone. Occasionally a few 

 pieces of quartz, porphyry, and gneiss, which I found only after some 

 search, connect the Clent Hill series with the beds of the Pudding- 

 stone Valley. In the latter, porphyry and gneiss occur in nearly equal 



* The Eev. W. B. Clarke, the veteran geologist of New South Wales, has given an excellent and 

 exhaustive resume on this question in his various publications on the Sedimentary Formations of New 

 South Wales, to which I wish to refer the reader. 



