Mesozoic Rocks. 
83 
Gippsland are all of the same geological age, and were formed 
contemporaneously under very similar conditions, and that between 
them and the rocks classed as Upper Palaeozoic of North Gipps- 
land and the Grampians there is a great stratigraphical break, 
representing an era of which we have no visible record whatever 
in the shape of rock-formations. This period seems to have been 
occupied, as regards the area of the present land surface of 
Victoria, in the work of denudation. After the completion of the 
Upper Palaeozoic beds, which, ns before pointed out, appear to 
have been formed during long-continued gradual submergence, an 
opposite movement set in, and the land rose again to as groat a 
height above the sea as it had been previous to the commencement 
of the Upper Palaeozoic layers. 
This upward movement of the Victorian land may not have 
extended to the central eastern portion of Australia, and, if so, we 
may conjecture that, during the period of emergence here, the 
northern portions New South Wales may have continued 
depressed, or even still sinking. This would imply continued 
accumulation there but denudation hero, and would account for 
the absence in Victoria, between the two series classed respectively 
as Upper Palmozoic and Mesozoic, of any formations that can 
■with certainty be referred to the age of the New South Wales 
coal-measures 
The only alternative surmise is, that rocks analogous to the last- 
mentioned were once deposited in Victoria, and were afterwards 
removed ; but I am more inclined to the belief that while the accu- 
mulation of the coal-measures was in progress in New South W ales 
the Victorian land was simply undergoing denudation. It cannot 
be said that representatives of the New South Wales coal- 
measures may not underlie portions of our Mesozoic areas, but so 
far as can be determined from the evidence of natural sections at 
their margins, the Mesozoic rocks rest directly ou Lower 
Palmozoic or older igneous rocks, and whatever intermediate 
formations may exist must lie concealed beneath the Mesozoic 
rocks in the deeper portions of the basins occupied by them. 
Under any circumstances, there must have elapsed, after the 
close of the Upper Palaeozoic period, and prior to the commence- 
ment of our Mosozoic formations, a long period during which 
denuding agencies were busy, and effected great changes on the 
then rising land surface of the country. When this rising move- 
ment had reached its greatest extent the land surface was more 
elevated than, now above the sea. The central mountain mass 
was still of far greater altitude than now above the contour of the 
present shore line, as it had not at that time lost the material of 
which it has been since denuded during Mesozoic and Tertiary 
times, and, notwithstanding the degradation experienced during 
the Upper Palmozoic period, still retained an Alpine character, 
being then very probably many hundreds, if not thousands of feet 
higher than at the present day. 
