10 _ ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS. @ 
prior find Mr. Clarke does not seem to have been at the time of — 
his own discovery aware. In 1842 he found gold on the Wollon- 
dilly. There is abundant evidence that from 1841 onwards Mr. 
Clarke frequently, in letters and-in conversations, expressed his _ 
conviction that the Colony was rich in gold. Still he maintained 
a certain amount of reserve on the subject, and fearing the possible 
evil effects on colonial society, he refrained from publishing his 
views to the world. In April, 1844, however, he communicated 7 
his opinions to the Governor, Sir George Gipps, and showed him © 
specimens of the gold, but was advised by him to “ put it away, 
as it would lead to dangerous consequences. In the early part of 
1844 Mr. Clarke announced the existence of gold to the north of — 
the Liverpool Dividing Range ; and in 1845 he obtained gold i 
several places in the Bathurst district. 
Tt was in 1844 that Sir Roderick Murchison, having just 
returned from an exploration of the Ural Mountains, had an : 7 
opportunity of examining the geological collection brought from 4 
Australia by Count Strzelecki, « Seeing” (he observes in 
Siluria), “the great similarity of the rocks in the two distant 
countries, I had little difficulty in drawing a parallel between 
them; in doing which I was naturally struck by the circumstance 
that no gold had yet been found in the meridional Australian 
ridge, which I termed, in anticipation, the Cordillera.” In 1846 
he wrote to the President-of the Royal Geological Society 4 
Cornwall, at its anniversary meeting, and “incited the super 
abundant Cornish tin-miners to emigrate to the Colony of New 
South Wales, and there obtain gold from ancient alluvia in 
quoting from a description of the 
we have here a third stm 
