PRE-SILURIAN STRATA AT HEATHCOTE. 
(NO. I ON LOCALITY MAP.) 
By E. J. Dunn, F.G.S., Director, Geological Survey, Victoria. 
I have the honour to report that I have met with a formation at 
Heathcote differing from any that has previously come under my observa¬ 
tion in Victoria, and that appears to have hitherto escaped description. 
The formation is of pre-Silurian age, and the beds of which it consists 
comprise highly siliceous and jaspideous rocks, very talcose splintery 
schists, tufaceous deposits, quartzite and ancient vesicular basalts—once 
surface flows, but now intercalated with other strata. 
The railway cuttings near Heathcote expose a tongue of these rocks. 
They extend and widen out in a northerly direction towards Mounts 
Camel and Pleasant. How far they continue has yet to be determined, 
as I only discovered the formation on Saturday last, and traced it towards 
Mount Camel. 
I have seen no rocks in Australia to correspond with those under 
notice, but they resemble in a marked manner a system of rocks 
that came under my notice near Auckland, New Zealand, on the islands 
Kawau and Waiheke. These same rocks continue through the Thames 
valley, and are known to New Zealand geologists as the Kaikoura or Te 
Anau series. 
In New Zealand these beds are highly metalliferous, bearing gold, 
copper, manganese and iron, in profitable quantities. 
It is very desirable that these rocks should be delimited, and at least 
a cursory examination made of them. 
[Report sent in 6th July, i8<pi.~\ 
QUARTZ REEFS NEAR WOODEND. 
(NO. 2 ON LOCALITY MAP.) 
By E. /. Dunn, F.G.S., Director, Geological Survey . 
Earle and Christie’s Reef. 
The site is a little to the W. of S., 6 miles from Woodend, and S. of 
the Main Divide. It is about i,8oo feet above sea level, in thickly 
timbered country. The camp is on a small western gully, off Fletcher’s 
Creek, which joins Gisborne Creek about three-quarters of a mile further 
to the south. The rocks are Ordovician sandstones and slates. 
On the surface a reef-course is traceable by a ferruginous outcrop at 
intervals for nearly 20 chains. In the gully crossing the line of reef, 
several shallow holes have been sunk in the alluvial, and a little gold 
is reported, but not in payable quantities. On the northern side of this 
small gully, a shaft has been sunk in yellow and pink soft slates and 
sandstones to a depth of 60 feet. A very irregular mixture of country 
rock and quartz spurs that strike about N. and S., and dip to the W. 
is exposed. There are no well defined walls, but the broken country 
rock and quartz form a “ mullocky ” reef, ranging from 1 foot to 2 feet 
in width. At 50 feet a cross-cut has been driven west. It is 
horizontal for 24 feet, and then rises to an air shaft. The beds disclosed 
