
1891.] Geology and Paleontology. | 909 
side of the rise forms a cliff.’ Further to the north the late Colonel 
Warburton found this same sandstone formation taxed his camels to 
the utmost. In the eastern colonies a desert sandstone exists, but 
whether similar to that in Western Australia, I cannot say. Mr. Wood- 
ward has satisfied himself that this formation overlies most, if not the 
whole of the western coast formations from Cambridge Gulf to King’s 
Sound, and that it extends far inland towards Central Australia. 
« Under this sandstone formation the Carboniferous series he 
describes as well developed, and if it continues right across the conti- 
nent, as it does in China, coal deposits may yet be found in the 
interior of Australia. He has also discovered a large lava flow in the 
northwest, and fixes the Leopold range as of Carboniferous age ; also 
that the coast of Western Australia is rapidly rising, and he describes 
the sandstone area as extending inland ‘asa vast table-land of from 
1,000 to 2,000 feet above sea-level. No volcanoes exist in the colony 
of Western Australia, and the general appearance of the country 
throughout indicates a condition of remarkable quiescence, continuing 
even further back than the Carboniferous epoch.’ He describes the 
rivers, for the most part, as ‘simply immense storm-water channels. 
Several large rivers have their sources in the western edge of this 
plateau, and cutting deep gorges through their upper horizontally 
bedded rocks, expose the underlying crystalline rocks across the strike 
of which they have cut their channels,’ and considers that ‘ precious 
stones may be found in the amygdaloid regions. The mineral-bearing 
districts have been greatly decomposed and altered by thermal waters 
and steam at the time of the deposition of the lodes, and later by the 
heat evolved by the oxidation of the metallic sulphides.’ He corrob- 
orates the opinion that the uppermost or desert sandstone is of ter- 
restrial origin, and probably formed shortly after the elevation of this 
continent. In places these beds are of terrestrial origin, there is not 
the slightest doubt ; in other places the indications point to a swampy 
or lacustrine source.”’ 
Structure of the Piedmont Plateau.—Prof. Williams, of Johns 
Hopkins University, offers the following hypothesis as to the structure 
of the Piedmont region in Maryland: 
‘‘ That the eastern area is composed of rocks far more ancient than 
the western, which extend out under these, forming the floor upon 
which they were deposited ; and that although already much folded and 
metamorphosed, this crystalline floor underwent at least one more fold- 
ing after the schists had been laid down, carrying these with it and 


