318 Geology of 



regular beds. There occur, also, some casts of gasteropods, mostly 

 filled in the interior with crystals of calcareous spar. The beds 

 are capped by loose marine sands, sometimes very calcareous, full of 

 fragments of shells, and of a light-yellowish or greenish colour. Here 

 and there harder bands of calcareous sandstones stand out from them 

 as protuberances. The same Ostrea, Pectunculus laticostatus, and 

 Pecten sect a occur in them. Between them beds of conglomerate are 

 interstratified, and the interstices between the pebbles mostly filled up 

 with calcareous spar. The beds along the banks of the Motanau 

 river and of Motanau island consist of similar strata, also resting upon 

 the Oamaru formation, apparently conformably. The lowest beds 

 consist of bluish sandy clays, with rolled pieces of shells, sometimes 

 forming regular layers ; they are divided in numerous banks by beds 

 of calcareous sandstone six inches to two feet thick, standing out as 

 protuberances. Sometimes the latter is separated in lenticular- 

 shaped masses, lying side by side in the sands. The uppermost 

 deposit consists of a thick layer of hard fossiliferous calcareous sand- 

 stone, sometimes forming cliffs along the sea coast for a considerable 

 distance, and in which most of the shells appear only as casts. This 

 bed dips near the mouth of the Motanau river 10 deg. to the south-east. 



There is a great similarity in the rocks belonging to this formation, 

 owing, without doubt, to the same physical conditions prevailing 

 during their deposition. The occurrence of small beds of lignite in 

 them is only an exception. The principal localities where such beds 

 have been met with are situated in the Moeraki Downs, at the 

 mouth of the "Waipara, in the Broken Eiver basin, and in White 

 Bock creek, a source branch of the Pareora river. The strata 

 belonging to this series lie either conformably upon the Oamaru 

 formation, or, what is still more usual, unconf ormably upon it. In many 

 localities, as, for instance, in the Pareora and AVaihao rivers, the 

 calcareous greensands have become greatly denuded before the Pareora 

 beds were deposited above them, or which is more commonly the 

 case, along them, when the former stood as islands in the tertiary sea. 

 From the sections attached to this chapter the relations of the beds to 

 each other can easily be made out, so that I need not enter here into 

 a more minute description. 



The Kanieri group at the \Vest Coast resembles in many respects 

 the Pareora beds on the East Coast. The lowest bed visible consists 

 of bluish sandy marls, glauconitic at their base. In them calcareous 



