Canterbury and Westland. 361 



CHAPTEE XIII. 



The Alluvial Goldfields of "Westlaxd. 



Although it is beyond the scope of this Report to give an exhaustive 

 account of the goldfield3 of Westland, I wish to offer at least some 

 remarks upon the formation of those beds in which the principal 

 workings are situated. They are of various character, and may be 

 classed as alluvial, glacier, and littoral deposits. The alluvial beds from 

 which the largest amount of gold has been, and is still being derived, 

 have been formed during, or at least immediately after, the termination 

 of the Pareora formation (Captain Hutton's Kanieri Group.) In 

 previous chapters I have already pointed out that before the advent of 

 that formation, and during the time the Oamaru series was deposited — 

 the land having sunk several thousand feet below its present level — 

 calcareous strata, finely grained, from the nature of the deposited 

 material, were thrown down. . These deposits, partly by raising the bed 

 of the ocean, but, and principally by the upheaval of the Islands, assumed 

 gradually a shallow-water or littoral character. It is at the same time 

 evident that many oscillations occurred, judging from the strata under 

 review, although a gradual rising was predominant. Thus we find, to 

 give the general features, that the lower finer grained Jimestones were 

 followed by claymarls and clays, the latter becoming more and more 

 arenaceous, till the uppermost beds, consisting of a loose ferruginous 

 sandstone, are reached. These last form the uppermost marine bed, as 

 they are everywhere succeeded by others of a very different character, to 

 which we may assign the name of the Great or Lower gold-drift of Xew 

 Zealand. Instead of marine strata, deltaic and fluviatile beds appear, 



