94 
Sedimentary Formations 
Thomson, in tlieir paper “ On the occurrence of Diamond near 
Mudyee ” (Trans. Roy. Soc. ofJSF.8. IV., 1S70, p. 94$) mako mcntioii 
of older and newer Pliocene drift. Whether there be any fossil 
evidence for the propriety of these terms .1 know not. That there 
are drifts of different parts of one epocli I believe; and, perhaps, 
the divisions arc good, even if the designations bo too refined. 
Dr. Duncan has advised us to postpone the Lyelliau designations 
for the present. Having very recently visited almost every 
locality mentioned in that paper, and examined for myself much 
of the alluvia of the gold-fields in a large portion of the county 
of Phillip, I am prepared to testify to the extreme faithfulness of 
the description given by Messrs. Taylor and Thomson. My 
remark, therefore, about the term Pliocene is not to be taken as 
complaining of it,♦but as a justification for the introduction of 
some of the drifts in question under the present head. A dis¬ 
tinction of time is however clearly marked in the character of the 
various deposits or in the difference of botanical remains. 
Perhaps some of these deposits in the gold-fields, as well as 
some of the shelly conglomerates at the mouth of the Flinders, 
had better be considered as belonging to the next division of my 
subject; and though placed as Tertiary, I am not satisfied they 
arc such, as no positive proof exists by unmistakable evidence 
that they are so. 
In the far Western interior, beyond the Darling, shelly deposits 
of line sandstone have been reached in well-making, and by the 
kindness of my friend Mr. Woore, C.O.L. of the Albert District, 
I have been put in possession of several good specimens, together 
with fossil wood, apparently not very ancient, which I believe to 
be Tertiary. 
I have also from another contributor a very good specimen of 
a Thalasxtna resembling T. Diner ii, from another part of U -New 
Holland,” which is said to have been found somewhere outlie 
right bank of the Darling, not far from Mount Murchison. For 
the species alluded to, see the late Mr. Bell’s paper in Q.J.G.S., 
1, p. 93. Mr. B. received it from the late William 8. Macleay, 
Esq., F.K.S., of Elizabeth Bay, Sydney. 
Mr. pain tree has stated in his views respecting the Desert- 
sandstone of his map, that it is a Kainozoic deposit, which once 
covered the greater part of Australia. In the places where it is 
in great force, in Northern Queensland, it overlies the Cretaceous 
rocks, and underlies lava beds. It contains fossil wood ; and a 
Tellina which I sent to Mr. Daintree, from the neighbourhood of 
Leichhardt's crossing-place, on the Minder’s River, would, lie 
says, if coining from the desert sandstone, show that that forma¬ 
tion is not lacustrine. In various parts of New South Wales 
there are cappings of fine hardened sandstone which may have 
some relation to the strata referred to. 
