y some
convulsion of nature. Had Capt. Flinders been able to examine the rock
formation of the Great Australian Bight, he would have found that it was
for the most part an oolitic limestone, with many shells imbedded in it,
similar in substance and in formation to the fossil bed of the Murray,
but differing from it in colour.

"The length of these cliffs from their second commencement is 33 leagues,
and that of the level bank from New Cape Paisley, where it was first seen
from the sea, no less than 145 leagues. The height of this extraordinary
bank is nearly the same throughout, being nowhere less by estimation than
400 feet, not anywhere more than 600. In the first 20 leagues the rugged
tops of some inland mountains were visible over it, but during the
remainder of its long course, the bank was the limit of our view.

"This equality of elevation for so great an extent, and the evidently
calcareous nature of the bank, at least in the upper 200 feet, would
bespeak it to have been the exterior line of some vast coral reef, which
is always more elevated than the interior parts, and commonly level with
high water mark. From the gradual subsiding of the sea, or perhaps from
some convulsion of nature, this bank may have attained its present height
above the surface, and however extraordinary such a change may appear,
yet when it is recollected that branches of coral still exist, upon Bald
Head, at the elevation of 400 feet or more, this supposition assumes a
degree of probability, and it would farther seem that the subsiding of
the waters has not been at a period very remote, since these frail
branches have yet neither been all beaten down nor mouldered away by the
wind and weather.

"If this supposition be well founded, it may with the fact of no other
hill or object having been perceived above the bank in the greater part
of its course, assist in forming some conjecture as to what may be within
it, which cannot as I judge in such case, be other than flat sandy plains
or water. The bank may even be a narrow barrier between an interior and
the exterior sea, and much do I regret the not having formed an idea of
this probability at the time, for notwithstanding the great difficulty
and risk, I should certainly have attempted a landing upon some part of
the coast, to ascertain a fact of so much importance."

Had there been any inland ranges they would have been seen by that
searching officer from the ocean, but it is clear th