OLDER TERTIARIES OE SOUTHERN AUSTRALIA. 
353 
In 1893 Mr. T. S. Hall and myself, in describing the Eocene beds 
of the Bellarine Peninsula,* * * § showed the “ Older Basalt ” (Miocene) 
of the Geological Survey to underlie their Oligocene, as represented 
by the clays of Curlewisf ; the latter wo showed to be Eocene, and 
consequently the “Older Basalt” must be Eocene or older. In the 
same year Professor Tate and Mr. Dormant wrote a paper entitled 
“'Correlation of the Marine Tertiarics of Australia,' in which they 
refer the beds at Spring Creek, Muddy Creek, Gellibrand River, 
Camperdown, Mornington, and Cheltenham, to Eocene ; upper beds 
at Muddy Creek, Jemmy’s Point, Portland, and the Glenelg River to 
Miocene. Later still in the same year Professor R. Tate, in his 
presidential address to the Australasian Association^ gives a table of 
the component systems of the Cainozoic of Australia, iDesides a vast 
amount of other valuable matter. 
In 1S9I a paper on the Older Tertiaries of Maude, with an 
indication of the sequence of the Eocene Rocks of Victoria, || was 
written by Mr. T. 8. Hall and myself, and this is, I believe, the first 
attempt of the kind made since the adoption of the new classification 
of the Older Tertiaries. The Older Basalt of that district is proved to 
be of Eocene age. The latest volume of the Progress Reports of the 
Victorian Geological Survey, only just issued, contains a valuable 
contribution to our knowledge in “ Notes on the Geological Features 
of an Area in South Gippsland,” by Mr. J. IT. Wright, in which the 
sequence of seven distinct sets of beds has been carefully worked out 
upon strati graphical evidence ; but the author, in the absence of reliable 
palaeontological evidence, cautiously refrains from attaching definite 
ages to the beds. 
REMARKS ON THE FAUNA. 
By far the commonest forms of life in our Tertiaries are Mollusca 
and Brachiopoda, and we are indebted chiefly to Professor R. Tate for 
the elaboration of the species, for he has already published one part 
on the brachiopoda, two parts on the lamellibranchs, and four parts on 
the gastropods, besides several other papers including representatives 
of these and other fossils. Sir F. McCoy at one time stated** that many 
species of mollusca were “ identical with extinct species of the same 
geological age in other localities both in Europe and North America”; 
but subsequent examinations have shown this to be incorrect, and I 
can safely assert that at present we do not know amongst the 
mollusca a single example of a European or North American fossil. 
From this it can be seen, as has recently been asserted by Sir F. 
McCoy, ff that the fauna is a characteristically Australian one, and on 
this account I fail to see what good can come of comparing with 
so-called European or American equivalents to prove or disjirove the 
* Proc. Rov. Soc. Vic., vol. vi., n.s., 1894, p. 1. 
t Prod. Pat Vic., Dec., iv., p. 26. 
X Trans. Roy. Soc. S.A., vol xvii., 1893, p. 203. 
§ A.A.A.S., Adelaide, 1893, p. 65. 
II Proc. Roy. Soc, Vic,, vol. vii., n.s., p. 180. 
IT Prog. Rep. Geo. Surv. Vic., vol. viii., 1894. 
** Exhib. Essays, 1866, Recent Zoology and Palaeontology of Victoria, p. 17. 
ft Prog. Rep. Geo. Surv. Vic., vol. viii., 1894, p. 48. 
T 
