Canterbury and Westland. 295 



triangular Ostrea, different from any of the fossil oysters above the 

 coal seams, is the most conspicuous. This oyster is accompanied by 

 casts of Panopsea, Cardita, Tellina, Trigonia, and a few others too 

 fragmentary to be made out. 



In all the principal localities the brown coal series is covered by a bed 

 of shell sandstone, containing a great number of fossil shells, of which 

 the following are the principal genera and species : — Dentalium 

 may us, (Sow.), Pleurotoma, Turbo, Neptunea, Conchothyra 'parasitica 

 (McCoy), Aporrhais, Scalaria, Turritella, Calyptrcea, Neritopsis> 

 Cypraea, Purpura-, Natica, Panopcea, Lutraria, JEriphylla, Zenatia y 

 Pholadomya, Lucina Americana, (Sow.), Astarte, Oytheria, Dosinia, 

 Cardium, Isocardia, Myacites, Protocardium, Venericardia, Crassatella, 

 Area, Mytilus, Trigonia, Cucullcea alta, (Sow.), Cucullcea ponderosa 

 (Hutton), Pectunculus, Pecten, Ostrea, Terebratella, Waldhei?nia, 

 Phynchonella. The following exuviae were also collected in the same 

 horizon : — Saurian bones (waterworn, in the Malvern Hills) ; teeth of 

 Lamna, Hybodus, and Otodus ; scales of Hybodus ; Dicotyledonous 

 leaves ; Araucarian cone and branches ; leaves and twigs of 

 Dammara. 



Above the oysterbeds, (a local name appropriately given to the 

 shellbeds), we meet either with a sandy clay iron ore (limonite) covered 

 by glauconitic, and higher up by argillaceous sands, as in the Grorge of 

 the "Waipara, or with deposits of white quartzose sands with bands 

 of ferruginous or calcareous sandstone, as in the Malvern Hills. The 

 latter also gradually alter to sandy beds of a more argillaceous nature, 

 both series being of a thickness of several hundred feet in the localities 

 named. In the Waipara, the upper portion of these sands contains 

 the remarkable concretionary nodules of limestone (Septaria) ranging 

 from one foot to twelve feet in diameter, and enclosing besides 

 saurian remains, specimens of Conchothyra parasitica, Cucullaea, and 

 twigs and leaves of a Dammara. In all other localities these septaria 

 are either missing, or when they do occur, never contain any saurian 

 remains ; and instead of them, (as, for instance, on the banks of the 

 Selwyn river) , layers, several feet thick, of a somewhat calcareous and 

 micaceous sandstone, divide the sandy beds into a number of banks. 

 In the Broken River basin the large black oyster continues to occur in 

 the sands for a considerable distance, lying either singly or in banks. 



The remains of fossil Reptilia from these septaria, collected by Mr. 

 Hood, myself, and others, have been described by Professor Owen in 



