THE SECRET OF ARTESIAN WATERS.

Tuapeka Times, Volume XXV, Issue 4252, 26 June 1895, Page 4

THE SECRET OF ARTESIAN WATERS.

Perhaps the most valuable paper read before the Science Congress at Brisbane was that on the artesian waters of the continent, by Mr Jack, the Government Geologist of Queensland. Many wild theories have been held as to the origin of theae waters, which have pratically added a new province to Quensland, and are openiuo a whole new korizion to the pastoral industry. They are supposed to come from New Guinea, from the Himalayas, from the Adean Peaks of South America. Mr Jack and his assistants however have traced a huge formation of bibulous sandstone for 1000 miles from the border, of New South Wales to the Gnlf of Carpentaria. It lies like a sponge, 5000 square miles in area, packed in between an upper and lower creta eoua formation. This huge, thirsty formation swallows up rivers whole. On the Darling River catchment, the mean rainfall is 22.14 in, but not quite one-sixtieth part of this really flows betwixt the visible river banks. Seventeen Darlings flow, sunless and subterranean through the loose texture of the great Braystone formation for one that creeps visible the river banks. The whole Con;inent, according to M> Jack, is leaky The tropical rains of Western Queensland vanish from human eyes almost as quick a as ihey fall, but they creep in sliding floods beneath the surface, and 0039 out a ferment of bubbling springs, on the opposite edge of the Continent, betwixt Warrnambool and the Murray Mouth. Mr Jack's investigations go to prove that the artesian waters of Queensland are practically limitless, and they may prove a more enduring source of wealth than either the silver leads of Broken Hill or the golden "blows" of Coolgardie.— "Review of Reviews,"