Beagle Expedition (1831-1836); Geology -- South America; Volcanoes
Calcareous deposits, like these of King George’s Sound, are of vast
extent on the Australian shores. Dr. Fitton remarks, that “recent
calcareous breccia (by which term all these deposits are included) was
found during Baudin’s voyage, over a space of no less than twenty-five
degrees of latitude and an equal extent of longitude, on the southern,
western, and north-western coasts.” (For ample details on this
formation consult Dr. Fitton “Appendix to Captain King’s Voyage.” Dr.
Fitton is inclined to attribute a concretionary origin to the branching
bodies: I may remark, that I have seen in beds of sand in La Plata
cylindrical stems which no doubt thus originated; but they differed
much in appearance from these at Bald Head, and the other places above
specified.) It appears also from M. Peron, with whose observations and
opinions on the origin of the calcareous matter and branching casts
mine entirely accord, that the deposit is generally much more
continuous than near King George’s Sound. At Swan River, Archdeacon
Scott states that in one part it extends ten miles inland.
(“Proceedings of the Geolog. Soc.” volume 1 page 320.) Captain Wickham,
moreover, informs me that during his late survey of the western coast,
the bottom of the sea, wherever the vessel anchored, was ascertained,
by crowbars being let down, to consist of white calcareous matter.
Hence it seems that along this coast, as at Bermuda and at Keeling
Atoll, submarine and subaerial deposits are contemporaneously in
process of formation, from the disintegration of marine organic bodies.
The extent of these deposits, considering their origin, is very
striking; and they can be compared in this respect only with the great
coral-reefs of the Indian and Pacific Oceans. In other parts of the
world, for instance in South America, there are SUPERFICIAL calcareous
deposits of great extent, in which not a trace of organic structure is
discoverable; these observations would lead to the inquiry, whether
such deposits may not, also, have been formed from disintegrated shells
and corals.
CAPE OF GOOD HOPE.
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