OCCURRENCE OF A SUBMERGED FOREST. 165 
upheaval of this portion of Australia has taken place since the 
last volcanic disturbances terminated.” 
From the evidence above quoted it is clear that in comparatively 
recent geological time there has been a relative change in the level 
of land and sea along the east and south coasts of Australia of 
about fifteen feet, and this amount of alteration seems so constant 
as to incline us to the opinion that it may be due, as so ably advo- 
cated by Suess in his classic work, “Das Antlitz der Erde,” rather 
to a negative movement of the ocean than toa positive movement 
of the land. On the other hand, Darwin, Clarke, and Wilkinson, 
have brought forward arguments, to which we think much weight 
should be attached, to show that in late Tertiary, perhaps even in 
Post-Tertiary time, there has been a considerable submergence, 
perhaps due to subsidence of the lithosphere, along the east. coast 
of Australia. In comparing the conflicting evidences as to sub- 
mergence and elevation along the east coast of Australia, the fact 
which has been well emphasized by Suess should always ve borne 
in mind, viz., that in case of oscillatory movements even when. 
the positive movement has greatly preponderated, it is chiefly as 
a rule, the traces of the negative movement that survive.” Positive 
movement (of the ocean) submerges old beach lines and hides them 
from view, witha covering of sediment, whereas raised beach lines . 
are exposed to view and are not easily obliterated. 
II.—Suea’s CREEK. 
(1): The locality as it was before the Canal was commenced.— 
Previous to the cutting of the present canal and the artificial 
raising of the level of the surrounding land, the area referred to 
in this paper was mostly a salt water swamp, through which crept 
the sluggish malodorous Shea’s Creek. Shea’s Creek rises to the 
east of Redfern in some low sandy hills, and can be traced thence 
for a distance of three and a half miles south-south-west, until its _ 
estuary joins that of Cook’s River, half a mile below the Cook’s — 
1 Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc., Vol. xxvitt., 1872, p. 273. 
? Das Antlitz der Erde, von Eduard Siiess, Vol. 11., p. 691, 1888. 
