Geology.] 
NATURAL HISTORY. 
603 
The horn-like projection of the land, on the east of the 
Gulf of Carpentaria, is a very prominent feature in the 
general map of Australia, and may possibly have some 
connexion with the structure just pointed out. The western 
shore of this horn, from the bottom of the gulf to Endeavour 
Straits, being very low ; while the land on the east coast rises 
in proceeding towards the south, and after passing Cape 
Weymouth, lat. 12° 30', is in general mountainous and abrupt; 
and Captain King’s specimens from the north-east coast, 
shew that granite is found in so many places along this line, 
as to make it probable that primitive rocks may form the 
general basis of the country in that quarter ; since a lofty 
chain of mountains is continued on the south of Cape Tri- 
bulation, not far from the shore, throughout a space of more 
than five hundred miles. It would carry this hypothesis 
too far, to infer that these primitive ranges are connected 
with the mountains on the west of the English settlements 
near Port Jackson, §*c., where Mr. Scott has described the 
coal-measures as occupying the coast from Port Stevens, 
about lat. 33° to Cape Howe, lat. 37°, and as succeeded, on 
the eastern ascent of the Blue Mountains, by sand-stone, and 
this again by primitive strata -But it may be noticed, that 
Wilson’s Promontory, the most southern point of New South 
Wales, and the principal islands in Bass’s Straits, contain 
granite ; and that primitive rocks occur extensively in Van 
Diemen’s Land. 
The uniformity of the coast lines is remarkable also in 
some other quarters of Australia ; and their direction, as well 
as that of the principal openings, has a general tendency to 
a course from the west of south to the east of north. This, 
for example, is the general range of the south-east coast, 
Annals of Philosophy, June, 1824. 
