286 
Corrcspondence — Mr. R. Etheridge, Jun. 
GOLD IN THE COAL-M EASURES OF NEW SOUTH WALES. 
Sir, — The following important facts, abstracted from a report by 
my friend Mr. C. S. Wilkinson, F.G.S., Government Geologist of 
New South Wales, to the Minister of Mines of that Colony, on the 
occurrence of payable gold in the New South Wales Coal-measures, 
may be of interest to your readers. Mr. Wilkinson observed that 
the gold found in the alluvial deposits of Tertiary age at the Old 
Tallawang and Clougli’s Gully diggings was derived from con- 
glomerates of Coal-measure age, associated with sandstone and 
shale containing the very characteristic genus of fossil plants, 
Glossopteris. At (Jlough’s Gully the conglomerate in situ is worked 
for gold, and has yielded nuggets weighing as much as five ounces. 
This is the first time that payable gold has been noticed to occur in 
the New South Wales Coal-measures, although it is to that Veteran 
in Australian geology, the Rev. W. B. Clarke, F.R.S., and the late 
Sir T. L. Mitchell, Surveyor General of New South Wales, that we 
are indebted for the first announcement of the fact that gold was to 
be found in rocks of the age in question. 1 Mr. Wilkinson also states 
that a collection of fossil fruits obtained from the “ Black Lead,” 
Gulgong, under a stratum of Basalt, and at a depth of 163 feet from 
the surface, has yielded to the researches of the Baron F. von 
Müller, M.D., F.R.S., etc., seven genera and nine species of new 
forms. The report concludes with a reference to another important, 
and at present, unique discovery by Mr. Wilkinson, that of a species 
of Unio in one of the Gulgong “deep leads,” “the first fossil shell 
of the kind yet discovered in the Pliocene Tertiary gold drifts.” 2 
Edinburgh, March 28, 1877. R- Etheridge, Jun. 
NATURAL OR ARTIFICIAL? FITS OF THE HAUTE MARNE. 
Sir, — At p. 210 of Le Bassin de Paris, by M. E. Beigrand, a 
letter from M. Royer is inserted giving the following account of 
some singulär excavations in the Portland Plateaux, Haute Marne. 
“On the high hills of the town of Poissons near Joinville, the 
culminating point of which reaehes the height of 200 metres above 
the river Rongeant, tliese cavities, from their depth and extent, 
acquire unusual importance ; certain of these hills are literally 
riddled with pits (puits) ramifying in all directions, sometimes 
liaving a subterranean communication one with another and reaching 
unascertained depths, sometimes exceeding 30 or 40 metres. The 
general cliaracter of these pits and the polish of their rocky 
walls suggest that an acid contained in the waters by which they 
were eroded, may liave contributed to their excavation ; but their 
extent and number suggest some more powerful agent; and wliat 
more powerful cause could you invoke than a great quantity of 
water, acting through a long period, falling into the fissures of the 
Portland rock, enlarging them, fashioning them, and giving them 
the capricious forms which we find everywhere in rocks subjected 
1 Clarke’s Southern Goldfields, New South Wales, 1860, pp. 44 and 244. 
2 Sydney Evening News, No. 2940, November 30th ; and Sxjdney Morning Herald, 
December 2nd, 1876. 
