Fossils. 
129 
Cretaceous age were known in Australia to contain fossil 
remains of the extraordinary Ichthyosaurus and Plesio- 
saurus; familiar from the illustration of thorn so common 
in text books of geology. The discovery; there- 
fore; of Triassic reptiles in the Hawkesbury-Wiana- 
matta beds was practically a new era in the study of 
the geology of the district round Sydney. 
In 1887 the late Mr. Wilkinson drew attention to 
the fact that soon after the discovery of the remains 
of the gigantic labyrinthodon Mastodonsaurus in the 
Hawkesbury Sandstone at Cockatoo Island; other 
specimens of one of these amphibians were received 
from Mr. B. Dunstan, who collected them from the 
Wianamatta Shales near Bowral. He also recognised 
on some slabs found at Gfosford the remains of another 
of these remarkable "frog-lizards." Professor Stephens 
undertook to examine the fossil; and in a paper which 
he read before our Linnean Society; ho described it 
under the new generic name of Platyceps. A collector 
was sent to explore the excavations at Gfosford; and 
succeeded in obtaining not only more Labyrinthodont 
remains; but a very magnificent collection numbering 
over 400 specimens of fossil fishes, ganoids and placoids, 
several of which are of remarkable formation, and 
appear to be new to science. Splendid impressions 
both of fishes and Labyrinthodon were to be seen on 
the same piece of rock. 
All the world over it has been noted that fossils 
are not particularly abundant in the New Red Sand- 
stones. But in rocks of this age in the Connecticut 
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