volume 2.) A permanent station under the superintendence of a British

officer, in a country so very little known, and in a situation so remote from any other English settlement, affords an opportunity of collecting objects of natural history, and of illustrating various points of great interest to physical geography and meteorology, which it is to be hoped will not be neglected. And as a very instructive collection, for the general purposes of geology, can readily be obtained in such situations, by attending to a few precautions, I have thought that some brief directions on this subject would not be out of place in the present publication; and have subjoined them to the list of specimens at the close of this paper.*

(*Footnote. See hereafter.)

In the vicinity of Cambridge Gulf, Captain King states, the character of the country is entirely changed; and irregular ranges of detached rocky hills composed of sandstone, rising abruptly from extensive plains of low level land, supersede the low and woody coast, that occupies almost uninterruptedly the space between this inlet and Cape Wessel, a distance of more than six hundred miles. Cambridge Gulf, which is nothing more than a swampy arm of the sea, extends to about eighty miles inland, in a southern direction: and all the specimens from its vicinity precisely resemble the older sandstones of the confines of England and Wales.* The View (volume 1 plate) represents in the distance Mount Cockburn, at the head of Cambridge Gulf; the flat rocky top of which was supposed to consist of sandstone, but has also the aspect of the trap-formation. The strata in Lacrosse Island, at the entrance of the Gulf, rise toward the north-west, at an angle of about 30 degrees with the horizon: their direction consequently being from north-east to south-west.

(*Footnote. I use the term Old Red Sand Stone, in the acceptation of Messrs. Buckland and Conybeare, Observations on the South Western Coal District of England. Geological Transactions Second Series volume 1. Captain King's specimens from Lacrosse Island are not to be distinguished from the slaty strata of that formation, in the banks of the Avon, about two miles below Clifton.)

From hence to Cape Londonderry, towards the south, is an uniform coast of moderate elevation; and from that point to Cape Leveque, although the outline may be in a general view considered as ranging from north-east to south-west,* the coast is remarkably indented, and the adjoining sea irregularly studded with very numerous islands. The specimens from this tract consist almost entirely of sandstone, resembling that of Cambridge Gulf, Goulburn Island, and the Gulf of Carpentaria; with which the trap-formation appears to be associated.

(*Footnote. The large chart Sheet 5 best shows the general range of the shore, from the islands filling up the inlets.)

York Sound, one of the principal inlets on this part of the coast, is bounded by precipitous rocks, from one to two hundred feet in height; and some conical rocky peaks, which not improbably consist of quartz-rock, were noticed on the eastern side of the entrance. An unpublished sketch, by Captain King, shows that the banks of Hunter's River, one of the branches of York Sound, at seven or eight miles from its opening, are composed of sandstone, in beds of great regularity; and this place is also remarkable for a copious spring of fresh water, one of the rarest phenomena of these thirsty and inhospitable shores.*

(*Footnote. Narrative 1.)

The most considerable inlet, however, which has yet been discovered in this quarter of Australia, is Prince Regent's River, about thirty miles to the south-west of York Sound, the course of which is almost rectilinear for about fifty miles in a south-eastern direction; a fact which will probably be found to be connected with the geological structure of the country. The general character of the banks, which are lofty and abrupt, is precisely the same with that of the rivers falling into York Sound; and the level of the country does not appear to be higher in the interior than near the coast. The banks are from two to four hundred feet in height, and consist of close-grained siliceous sandstone, of a reddish hue;* and the view (Plate above) shows that the beds are nearly horizontal, and very regularly disposed; the cascade there represented being about one hundred and sixty feet in height, and the beds from six to twelve feet in thickness. Two conspicuous hills, which Captain King has named Mounts Trafalgar and Waterloo, on the north-east of Prince-Regent's River, not far from its entrance, are remarkable for cap-like summits, much resembling those which characterize the trap formation. (Sketch 3.)

(*Footnote. Narrative 1 and 2.)

The coast on the south of this remarkable river, to Cape Leveque, has not yet been thoroughly examined; but it appears from Captain King's Chart (Number 5) to be intersected by several inlets of considerable size, to trace which to their termination is still a point of great interest in the physical geography of New Holland. The space thus left to be explored, from the Champagny Isles to Cape Leveque, corresponds to more than one hundred miles in a direct line; within which extent nothing but islands and detached portions of land have yet been observed. One large inlet especially, on the south-east of Cape Leveque, appears to afford considerable promise of a river; and the rise of the tide within the Buccaneer's Archipelago, where there is another unexplored opening, is no less than thirty-seven feet.

The outline of the coast about Cape Leveque itself is low, waving, and rounded; and the hue for which the cliffs are remarkable in so many parts of the coast to the north, is also observable here, the colour of the rocks at Point Coulomb being of a deep red: but on the south of the high ground near that Point, the rugged stony cliffs are succeeded by a long tract, which to the French voyagers (for it was not examined by Captain King) appeared to consist of low and sandy land, fronted by extensive shoals. It has hitherto been seen, however, only at a distance; so that a space of more than three hundred miles, from Point Gantheaume nearly to Cape Lambert, still remains to be accurately surveyed.

Depuch Island, east of Dampier's Archipelago, about latitude 20 degrees 30 minutes, is described by the French naturalists as consisting in a great measure of columnar rocks, which they supposed to be VOLCANIC; and they found reason to believe that the adjoining continent was of the same materials.* It is not improbable, however, that this term was applied to columns belonging to the trap formation, since no burning mountain has been any where observed on the coast of New Holland: nor do the drawings of Depuch Island, made on board Captain King's vessel, give reason to suppose that it is at present eruptive. Captain King's specimens from Malus Island, in Dampier's Archipelago (sixty miles farther west) consist of greenstone and amygdaloid.

(*Footnote. Peron volume 1 page 130.)

The coast is again broken and rugged about Dampier's Archipelago, latitude 20 degrees 30 minutes; and on the south of Cape Preston, in latitude 21 degrees, is an opening of about fifteen miles in width, between rocky hills, which has not been explored. From thence to the bottom of Exmouth Gulf, more than one hundred and fifty miles, the coast is low and sandy, and does not exhibit any prominences. The west coast of Exmouth Gulf itself is formed by a promontory of level land, terminating in the North-west Cape; and from thence to the south-west, as far as Cape Cuvier, the general height of the coast is from four to five hundred feet; nor are any mountains visible over the coast range.

Several portions of the shore between Shark's Bay and Cape Naturaliste have been described in the account of Commodore Baudin's Expedition; but some parts still remain to be surveyed. From the specimens collected by Captain King and the French descriptions, it appears that the islands on the west of Shark's Bay abound in a concretional calcareous rock of very recent formation, similar to what is found on the shore in several other parts of New Holland, especially in the neighbourhood of King George's Sound; and which is abundant also on the coast of the West Indian Islands, and of the Mediterranean. Captain King's specimens of this production are from Dirk Hartog's and Rottnest Islands; and M. Peron states that the upper parts of Bernier and Dorre Islands are composed of a rock of the same nature. This part of the coast is covered in various places with extensive dunes of sand; but the nature of the base, on which both these and the calcareous formation repose, has not been ascertained.

The general direction of the rocky shore, from North-west Cape to Dirk Hartog's Island, is from the east of north to the west of south. On the south of the latter place the land turns towards the east. High, rocky and reddish cliffs have been seen indistinctly about latitude 27 degrees; and a coast of the same aspect has been surveyed, from Red Point, about latitude 28 degrees, for more than eighty miles to the south-west. The hills called Moresby's flat-topped Range, of which Mount Fairfax, latitude 28 degrees 45 minutes, is the highest point, occupy a space of more than fifty miles from north to south.

Rottnest Island and its vicinity, latitude 32 degrees, contains in abundance the calcareous concretions already mentioned; which seem there to consist in a great measure of the remains of recent shells, in considerable variety. The islands of this part of the shore have been described by MM. Peron and Freycinet;* and the coast to the south, down to Cape Leeuwin, the south-western extremity of New Holland, having been sufficiently examined by the French voyagers, was not surveyed by Captain King.

(*Footnote. Peron volume 2 page 168 etc.)

Swan River (Riviere des Cygnes) upon this part of the coast, latitude 31 degrees 25 minutes to 32 degrees, was examined by the French expedition, to the distance of about twenty leagues from its mouth; and found still to contain salt water. The rock in its neighbourhood consisted altogether of sandy and calcareous incrustations, in horizontal beds, enclosing, it is stated, shells, and the roots and even trunks of trees. Between this river and Cape Peron, a "great bay" was left unexplored.*

(*Footnote. Peron volume 1 page 179. Freycinet page 5. 170.)

The prominent mass of land, which stands out from the main, between Cape Naturaliste and Cape Leeuwin, and runs nearly on the meridian for more than fifty miles, seems to have a base of granite, which, at Cape Naturaliste, is said to be stratified.* The same rock also occurs, among Captain King's specimens, from Bald-head in King George's Sound; but nearly on the summit of that hill, which is about five hundred feet high, were Found the ramified calcareous concretions, erroneously considered as corals by Vancouver and others;** but which appear, from Captain King's specimens, to be nothing more than a variety of the recent limestone so abundant throughout these shores.

(*Footnote. Peron volume 1 page 69.)

(**Footnote. Vancouver 1 49. D'Entrecasteaux 2 175. Freycinet 105. Flinders 1 63. See the detailed descriptions hereafter; and Captain King's Narrative volume 1.)

The south coast, and the southern portion of the east coast of Australia, which were surveyed by Captain Flinders, are described in the account of his voyage, and do not come within the object of the present paper.

...

GEOLOGICAL REMARKS.

1. The rocks, of which specimens occur in the collections of Captain King and Mr. Brown, are the following:

Granite: Cape Cleveland; C. Grafton; Endeavour River; Lizard Island; Round Hill, near C. Grindall; Mount Caledon; Island near C. Arnhem; Melville Bay; Bald-head, King George's Sound.

Various Slaty Rocks: Mica-State: Mallison's I. Talc-State: Endeavour River. Slaty Clay: Inglis' I., Clack I., Percy I. Hornblende Rock ?: Pobassoo's Island; Halfway Bay, Prince Regent's River.

Granular Quartz: Endeavour River; Montagu Sound, North-west Coast. Epidote: C. Clinton ?; Port Warrender; Careening Bay.

Quartzose Conglomerates, and ancient Sandstones: Rodd's Bay; Islands of the north and north-west coasts; Cambridge Gulf; York Sound; Prince Regent's River.

Pipe-clay: Melville Bay; Goulburn I.; Lethbridge Bay.

ROCKS OF THE TRAP FORMATION.

Serpentine: Port Macquarie; Percy Isles.

Sienite: Rodd's Bay.

Porphyry: C. Cleveland.

Porphyritic Conglomerate: C. Clinton, Percy I., Good's I.

Compact Felspar: Percy I., Repulse Bay, Sunday Island.

Greenstone: Vansittart Bay, Bat I., Careening Bay, Malus I.

Clinkstone: Morgan's I., Pobassoo's I.

Amygdaloid, with Chalcedony: Port Warrender; Half-way Bay; Bat Island; Malus I.

Wacke ?: Bat Island.

...

Recent calcareous Breccia: Sweer's Island, N. coast. Dirk Hartog's and Rottnest Islands, etc., West coast. King George's Sound, South coast.

The only information that has been published respecting the geology of New Holland, besides what is contained in the Voyages of Captain Flinders and Commodore Baudin, is a slight notice by Professor Buckland of some specimens collected during Mr. Oxley's Expedition to the River Macquarie,* in 1818; and a brief outline of a paper by the Reverend Archdeacon Scott, entitled A Sketch of the Geology of New South Wales and Van Diemen's Land, which has been read before the Geological Society.** On these authorities, the following may be added to the preceding list of rocks:

Limestone, resembling in the character of its organic remains the mountain limestone or England: Interior of New Holland, near the east coast; Van Diemen's Land (Buckland; Prevost manuscripts; Scott).

The Coal-formation: East coast of New Holland; Van Diemen's Land. (Buckland-Scott.)

Indications of the new red-Sandstone (Red-Marl) afforded by the occurrence of Salt: Van Diemen's Land. (Scott.)

Oolite: Van Diemen's Land. (Scott.)

(*Footnote. Geological Transactions volume 5 page 480.)

(**Footnote. Ann. of Phil. June 1824. I am informed that Mr. Von Buch also has published a paper on the rocks of New Holland; but have not been so fortunate as to meet with it.

Since this paper has been at the press, a Report presented to the Academy of Sciences at Paris, on the Voyage of Discovery of M. Duperrey, performed during the years 1822 to 1825, has been published; from whence I have subjoined an extract, in order to complete the catalogue of the rocks of Australia, according to the present state of our information.

Les echantillons recueillis tant dans les contrees voisines du Port Jackson, que dans les Montagnes-Bleues, augmentent beaucoup nos connoissances sur ces parties de la Nouvelle Hollande. Les echantillons, au nombre de soixante-dix, nous offrent, 1. Les granites, les syenites-quartziferes, et les pegmatites (granites graphiques) qui cunstituent le second plan des Muntagnes-Bleues. 2. Les gres ferrugineux, et renfermant d'abondantes paillettes de fer oligiste, qui couvrent non seulement une vaste etendue de pays pres des cotes, mais encore le premier plan des Montagnes-Bleues; et 3. Le lignite stratiforme qu'on exploite au Mont-Yorck, a 1000 pieds au-dessus du niveau de la mer, et dont la presence ajoute aux motifs qui portent a penser que les gres ferrugineux de ces contrees appartiennent au systeme des terrains tertiaires.

Vingt-sept echantillons ramasses a la terre de Van Diemen, dans les environs du port Dalrymple, et pres du Cap Barren, indiquent, 1. Des terrains de pegmatite, et de serpentine. 2. Des terrains intermediaires coquilliers, formes du grauwacke-schistoide, et de pierre calcaire. 3. Des terrains tres-recens, composes d'argile sablonneuse et ferrugineuse, avec geodes de fer hydrate, et du bois fossile, a differens etats. On distingue en outre des belles topazes blanches ou bleuatres, parmi les galets quartzeux, qui ont ete recueillis au Cap Barren: Bulletin des Sciences Naturelles, Octobre 1825 page 189.)

2. The specimens of Captain King's and Mr. Brown's collections, without any exception, agree with those of the same denominations from other parts of the world; and the resemblance is, in some instances, very remarkable: The sandstones of the west and north-west of New Holland are so like those of the west of England, and of Wales, that the specimens from the two countries can scarcely be distinguished from each other; the arenaceous cement in the calcareous breccia of the west coast is precisely the same with that of Sicily; and the jasper, chalcedony, and green quartz approaching to heliotrope, from the entrance of Prince Regent's River, resemble those of the Tyrol, both in their characters and association. The Epidote of Port Warrender and Careening Bay, affords an additional proof of the general distribution of that mineral; which, though perhaps it may not constitute large masses, seems to be of more frequent occurrence as a component of rocks than has hitherto been supposed.* The mineral itself, both crystallized and compact, the latter in the form of veins traversing sienitic rocks, occurs, in Mr. Greenough's cabinet alone, from Malvern, North Wales, Ireland, France, and Upper Saxony. Mr. Koenig has found it extensively in the sienitic tract of Jersey;** where blocks of a pudding-stone, bearing some resemblance to the green breccia of Egypt, were found to be composed of compact epidote, including very large pebbles of a porphyritic rock, which itself contains a considerable proportion of this substance. And Mr. Greenough has recently received, among specimens sent home by Mr. J. Burton, junior, a mass of compact epidote, with quartz and felspar, from Dokhan, in the desert between the Red Sea and the Nile. When New Holland is added to these localities, it will appear that few minerals are more widely diffused.

(*Footnote. See Cleaveland's Mineralogy 1816 page 297 to 300.)

(**Footnote. Plee's Account of Jersey quarto Southampton 1817 page 231 to 276.)

3. The unpublished sketches, by Captain King and Mr. Roe, of the hills in sight during the progress of the survey of the Coasts of Australia, accord in a very striking manner with the geological character of the shore. Those from the east coast, where the rocks are primitive, representing strongly marked and irregular outlines of lofty mountains, and frequently, in the nearer ground, masses of strata highly inclined. The outlines on the contrary, on the north, north-west, and western shores, are most commonly uniform, rectilinear, the summits flat, and diversified only by occasional detached and conical peaks, none of which are very lofty.

4. No information has yet been obtained, from any of the collections, respecting the diluvial deposits of Australia: a class of phenomena which is of the highest interest, in an island of such vast extent, so very remote in situation, and of which the existing animals are so different from those of other parts of the globe. It is remarkable, also, that no limestone is among the specimens from the northern and western shores, except that of the recent breccia; and although negative conclusions are hazardous, it would seem probable, from this circumstance, that limestone cannot be very abundant or conspicuous at the places visited. No eruptive mountains, nor any traces of recent volcanic eruption, have yet been observed in any part of Australia.

5. The recent calcareous breccia, of which a detailed description will be found in the subjoined list of specimens, is one of the most remarkable productions of New Holland: It was found, during the expedition of Commodore Baudin, to exist throughout a space of no less than twenty-five degrees of latitude, and an equal extent of longitude, on the southern, west, and north-west coasts;* and from Mr. Brown's specimens it appears to occur also on the shores of the Gulf of Carpentaria. The full account which M. Peron has given of this formation, sufficiently shows its resemblance to the very recent limestone, full of marine shells, which abounds on the shores of the Mediterranean, the West India Islands, and in several other parts of the world: And it is a point of the greatest interest in geology, to determine, whether any distinct line can really be drawn, between those concretions, unquestionably of modern formation, which occur immediately upon the shore; and other calcareous accumulations, very nearly resembling them, if not identical, both in the fossils they contain, and in the characters of the cementing substances, that are found in several countries, at considerable heights above the sea.

(*Footnote. Voyage 2 page 168, 169 to 216 etc.)

Dr. Buckland has described a breccia of modern formation, which occurs upon the shore at Madagascar, and consists of a firmly-compacted cream-coloured stone, composed of granular fragments of shells, agglutinated by a calcareous cement.* The stone of Guadaloupe, containing the human skeletons, is likewise of the same nature; and its very recent production cannot be doubted, since it contains fragments of stone axes, and of pottery.** The cemented shells of Bermuda, described by Captain Vetch,*** which pass gradually into a compact limestone, differ only in colour from the Guadaloupe stone; and agree with it, and with the calcareous breccia of Dirk Hartog's Island, in the gradual melting down of the cement into the included portions, which is one of the most remarkable features of that rock.**** A calcareous compound, apparently of the same kind, has been recently mentioned, as of daily production in Anastasia Island, on the coast of East Florida;***** and will probably be found to be of very general occurrence in that quarter of the globe. And Captain Beaufort's account of the process by which the gravelly beach is cemented into stone, at Selinti, and several other places on the coast of Karamania, on the north-east of the Mediterranean,****** accords with M. Peron's description of the progress from the loose and moveable sands of the dunes to solid masses of rock.******* In the island of Rhodes, also, there are hills of pudding-stone, of the same character, considerably elevated above the sea. And Captain W.H. Smyth, the author of Travels in Sicily, and of the Survey of the Mediterranean recently published by the Admiralty, informs me, that he has seen these concretions in Calabria, and on the coasts of the Adriatic; but still more remarkably in the narrow strip of recent land (called the Placca) which connects Leucadia, one of the Ionian Islands, with the continent, and so much resembles a work of art, that it has been considered as a Roman fabric. The stone composing this isthmus is so compact, that the best mill-stones in the Ionian Islands are made from it; but it is in fact nothing more than gravel and sand cemented by calcareous matter, the accretion of which is supposed to be rapidly advancing at the present day.

(*Footnote. Geological Transactions volume 5 page 479.)

(**Footnote. Linnean Transactions 12 page 53 to 57.)

(***Footnote. Geological Transactions 2nd Series volume 1 page 172.)

(****Footnote. Koenig Philosophical Transactions 1814 page 107 etc.)

(*****Footnote. Bulletin des Sciences Nat. Mars 1825.)

(******Footnote. Beaufort's Description of the South Coast of Asia Minor etc. Second edition. London 1818: pages 180 to 184 etc. In the neighbourhood of Adalia the deposition of calcareous matter from the water is so copious that an old watercourse had actually crept upwards to a height of nearly three feet; and the rapidity of the deposition was such that some specimens were collected on the grass, where the stony crust was already formed, although the verdure of the leaf was as yet but imperfectly withered (page 114): a fact which renders less extraordinary M. Peron's statement that the excrements of kangaroos had been found concreted by calcareous matter. Peron volume 2 page 116.)

(*******Footnote. Voyage 2 116.)

The nearest approach to the concreted sand-rock of Australia, that I have seen, is in the specimens presented by Dr. Daubeny to the Bristol Institution, to accompany his excellent paper on the geology of Sicily;* which prove that the arenaceous breccia of New Holland is very like that which occupies a great part of the coast, almost entirely around that island. Some of Dr. Daubeny's specimens from Monte Calogero, above Sciacca, consist of a breccia, containing angular fragments of splintery limestone, united by a cement, composed of minute grains of quartzose-sand disseminated in a calcareous paste, resembling precisely that of the breccia of Dirk Hartog's Island: and a compound of this kind, replete with shells, not far, if at all, different from existing species, fills up the hollows in most of the older rocks of Sicily; and is described as occurring, in several places, at very considerable heights above the sea. Thus, near Palermo, it constitutes hills some hundred feet in height; near Girgenti, all the most elevated spots are crowned with a loose stratum of the same kind; and the heights near Castro Giovanni, said to be 2880 feet above the sea, are probably composed of it. But although the concretions of the interior in Sicily much resemble those of the shore, it is still doubtful whether the former be not of more ancient formation; and if they contain nummulites, they would probably be referred to the epoch of the beds within the Paris basin.

(*Footnote. Edinburgh Philosophical Journal 1825 pages 116, 117, 118, and 254 to 255.)

The looser breccia of Monte Pelegrino, in Sicily, is very like the less compacted fragments of shells from Bermuda, described by Captain Vetch, and already referred to:* and the rock in both these cases, nearly approaches to some of the coarser oolites of England.

(*Footnote. These specimens are in the Museum of the Geological Society.)

The resemblance pointed out by M. Prevost,* of the specimens of recent breccia from New Holland, in the museum at the Jardin du Roi, to those of St. Hospice near Nice, is confirmed by the detail given by Mr. Allan in his sketch of the geology of that neighbourhood;** in which the perfect preservation of the shells, and their near approach to those of the adjoining sea at the present day, are particularly mentioned; and it is inferred that the date of the deposit which affords them, is anterior to that of the conglomerate containing the bones of extinct quadrupeds, likewise found in that country. M. Brongniart also, who examined the place himself, mentions the recent accumulation which occurs at St. Hospice, about sixty feet above the present level of the sea, as containing marine shells in a scarcely fossil state (a peine fossiles) and he describes the mass in which they occur, as belonging to a formation still more recent than the upper marine beds of the environs of Paris.***

(*Footnote. Prevost manuscripts. See hereafter.)

(**Footnote. Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh volume 8 1818 page 427 etc. See also the previous publications of M. Risso Journal des Mines tome 34 etc.)

(***Footnote. Brongniart in Cuvier Ossemens Fossiles; 2nd Edit. volume 2 page 427.)

The geological period indicated by these facts, being probably more recent than the tertiary beds containing nummulites, and generally than the Paris and London strata, accords with the date which has hitherto been assigned to the crag beds of Suffolk, Essex, and Norfolk:* but later observations render doubtful the opinion generally received respecting the age of these remarkable deposits, and a full and satisfactory account of them is still a desideratum in the geology of England. When, also, our imperfect acquaintance with the travertino of Italy, and other very modern limestones containing freshwater shells, is considered,** the continual deposition of which, at the present time, cannot be questioned (though probably the greater part of the masses which consist of them may belong to an era preceding the actual condition of the earth's surface) it would seem that the whole subject of these newer calcareous formations requires elucidation: and, if the inferences connected with them do not throw considerable doubt upon some opinions at present generally received, they show, at least, that a great deal more is to be learned respecting the operations and products of the most recent geological epochs, than is commonly supposed.

(*Footnote. Conybeare and Phillips Outlines etc. page 11, Geological Transactions 1 page 327 etc. Taylor in Geological Transactions 2nd series