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very prominent but barely angulated at the point of the base in advance of the pillar; the canal is shallow and open, with a very reverted funnel-edge. Inner-lip concave, with a thick, narrow, defined labial pad, running down the very short pillar, whose point is sharp and expanded but not flanged. Operculum plain-edged, small, triangular, slightly subspiral, having its apex terminal and bent in towards the left. H. 0'57, B. 033. Penultimate whorl, height o'14. Mouth, height 025, breadth 0.2. Closely allied to N. Woodwardi, Forbes, but quite distinct. Buccinum spinulosum,

Phil. seems to have many points of resemblance, but judging from the description and figure, the ribs and spirals are much stronger, and the mouth is pointed above, and is longer below N. ephamilla having a broader and more truncate base.

A JOURNEY AMONG THE NEW ZEALAND
GLACIERS.

BY REV. W. S. GREEN, M.A.

Read before the Royal Irish Academy, June 26th, 1882.

The whole of New Zealand consists of a line of upheaved stratified rocks, modified in the northern portion by recent volcanic activity, and in one or two other places showing traces of more ancient vulcanicity. The axis of elevation runs from S.W. to N.E., and is cut across into the North Island, South Island, and Stewart's Island, by Cook's and Foveaux' Straits. In the South Island the mountains attain to their greatest elevation, and for over one hundred miles the Southern Alps, as they were named by Captain Cook, raise their peaks far above the snow line, in no place for the whole of that distance descending to a col or pass free from eternal snow and ice. Immense glaciers fill the valleys, and the remains of still more gigantic glaciers are everywhere to be met with.

This chain, with its continuation north and south, seems to have been upheaved in Jurassic times, and though it has experienced many vicissitudes of upheaval and depression, it has never since, according to Professor Hutton, been submerged. These mountains are then of vastly greater antiquity than their European rivals, and their long exposure to the frosts and storms of ages is abundantly evidenced by the heaps of loose splintered stones to which all except the higher peaks have been reduced.

The mountains lie close to the west coast; their western flanks possess a humid climate (the rain-fall at Hokitika being measured at 118 inches), and are clothed with forest and impenetrable scrub. The western glaciers in some places descend to within 670 feet of the sea, and the rivers are short and swift. This low descent of the glaciers and the mean line of perpetual snow being at about 5000 feet, compared with Sooo in Switzerland, where also

no glacier descends to within 4000 feet of the sea, is particularly instructive, when we consider that these Southern Alps are at about the same distance from the Equator as the Pyrenees and the city of Florence. To the east of the mountains the land drops suddenly to a level of about 2000 feet above the sea, and then by gentle slopes and immense flat bare plains sinks gradually to the coast. The continuity of the plains is broken by ridges of low rounded hills, which on close examination often prove to be old moraine accumulations; while many of the plains are the basins of ancient lakes, the old shores being very sharply defined. In the southern and northern portions of the South Island the arrangement of mountains and plains is considerably modified by the splitting up and bifurcation of the main axis of elevation, but flat plains extending to the very foot of the highest peaks of the main chain are most characteristic of New Zealand, and totally unlike other mountainous countries, where ranges of foot-hills have to be ascended and upland valleys traversed before the higher ranges can be reached. In the province of Canterbury, where the mountains attain their greatest height in Mount Cook, or Ao-Rangi as it is called in the Maori tongue, these features are most distinctly observable, the Canterbury plains followed by the Mackenzie plains extending up to the very ice, and so flat that Dr Haast said he would undertake to drive a buggy the whole way from Christchurch to the foot of the Tasman glaciers. We tried it with an express wagon and three horses, and nearly accomplished it. The country was level enough, but the boulders as we drew near to the glaciers proved a little too much for a wheeled vehicle, and our waggon ended its days by being capsized in the Tasman river.

These New Zealand rivers have been a source of much difficulty to colonial development. They are so swift and erratic in their courses that fords are dangerous and bridges difficult to construct. Once the rivers leave the mountains there is nothing to keep them to one channel, as the plains, being composed of loose boulders and sand, are easily eaten away by the swift streams swelled in summer by the melting of the snow. A river bed is therefore a broad sheet of gravel through which a number of small streams wander and change day by day-what was a main channel one day being quite a secondary stream in the lapse of a week or so. Much time was often spent in crossing one river, with the delays of searching for fords; but now that railways run north and south the problem has been solved on the most important route by bridges, some nearly a mile in length. In the province of Otago rich woods extend right across the island to the east coast, giving place in many districts, however, to immense plains covered with tussock grass and Spaniard or sword grass, except where the farmer has come and adorned the landscape with waving fields of wheat. Farther north the great snowy chain seems to form a complete barrier to the moisture and vegetation of the west; the plains, hills, and valleys are all bare, as if shaven, and of the one uniform brownish-yellow

hue. Clumps of flax (Phormium tenax) and isolated cabbage trees (Cordyline australis) make the desolation appear more desolate. The rain-fall is but 25 inches. The air is clear, bright, and exhilarating, and when we do penetrate into the furthest recesses of the mountains, to the very brink of the glaciers, we at last come to a rank vegetation brought into existence by the rains condensed by the cold ice peaks. Acclimatization has produced wonderful results in New Zealand. On the great grassy plains, where the moa once stalked majestically, the skylark is now the commonest of birds, the sparrow threatens to become a plague, as the rabbit has done, and English weeds seem determined to establish themselves and attain to a fertility unexampled at home. Clouds of thistle-down fill the air, and sorrel usurps the ground prepared for oats and wheat. Amongst other interesting points brought out by this invasion of the vegetable kingdom, one at least is worthy of special notice-the failure of red clover, while white clover thrives amazingly. In the neighbouring island of Tasmania red clover grows well, and it is now believed that till the humble bee is introduced to fertilize the flowers, red clover will not propagate itself in New Zealand.*

On the 12th of last November I sailed from Plymouth for Melbourne in the Orient steamer "Garonne," having arranged with Ulrich Kaufmann and Emil Boss, both of Grindelwald, to follow me in the next ship. Unfortunately small-pox broke out in my ship, and between a delay at the Cape and quarantine at Melbourne I was not able to reach New Zealand and join my men till February 5th. Immediately on landing I received a kind telegram from Dr. Hector, and a letter from the Minister for Railways enclosing free passes on the New Zealand railways for myself and guides during our stay in the Colony. I lost no time in reaching Christchurch, where I spent an afternoon in Dr. Haast's company, he being the great authority on the topography of the Southern Alps; and next morning we started in the train for the south. On arriving at Timaru we had a delay of three hours before the train left by a branch line for Albury, and we occupied the time in purchasing provisions for our mountain journey. As we were assured that we could get sheep right up to the snows of Mount Cook, we took with us but a small supply of meat in tins. Flour, meal, bread, and biscuits, formed the bulk of our stores.

On reaching Albury by rail we hired a waggon and horses, and on the evening of the next day we got our first view of the great snowy range. The contrast between the brown, flattened downs over which we drove and the purple, ice-seamed peaks was most striking. Next morning we were up betimes, as we did not know how long our journey might be, and our driver was unacquainted with the country beyond this point. Our road soon lost itself in the rolling downs, so we walked on in advance pioneering the way, and thus before mid-day we reached the

* See Meeting of Cant. Phil. Inst. held on 7th June, 1883.

last swell overlooking the Tasman river. We had now to descend about 200 feet, and again came upon the track leading up the river bed. This river bed of the Tasman, over two miles wide, is a broad sheet of coarse gravel, through which the river meanders in countless channels, between which are often dangerous quicksands. We drove along over marshy flats, on which numerous seagulls had their nests (one of the young seagulls we afterwards met high up on the glacier, winging its flight over the snowy range to the west coast), then across river channels, and then over wide tracts of gravel. Right before us, rising abruptly from the river bed, in the point where the valley forked, was the great mass of Mount Cook, its icy peak glittering like a pinnacle of frosted silver against the deep blue sky. On either side the mountains rose from the flat valley with the same abruptness, and the terminal face of the Hooker and Tasman glaciers closed in the end of the two branches into which the valley divided to the right and left of Mount Cook. This flat river bed, with the mountains rising from it abruptly, and from margins as sharply defined as the shores of a lake, is so typical of all the mountain valleys we saw, that we may ask, What is the cause of a feature so distinctive? I believe the low level to which the glaciers descend, and the consequent short incline of the rivers, is a sufficient cause. The terminal face of the Tasman glacier is, according to Dr Haast, only 2456 feet above the sea ; while the mean of four observations, taken in as many days by myself, makes it 100 feet lower; and its river descends to the sea level by a fairly uniform incline of about 25 feet to the mile. If the river had a greater depth to descend before reaching the level country or sea level, it would erode a deep ravine-shaped bed, like those so common in the European Alps. High up on the mountain slopes, on the side of the valley opposite to where we travelled, were the most remarkable series of terrace formations I ever saw, their level being quite 500 or 600 feet above the present river, and their edges sharply defined. Dr. Haast considers that they form part of the margin of an ancient lake, which was dammed up by a glacier crossing the valley lower down during the last great glacier period.

The

Accepting, in part, this interpretation of the phenomena, several interesting questions follow, which we will try to answer : What river or rivers fed this lake? Was it the Tasman ? present source of the Tasman being about 200 feet lower than the terraces, would be below the level of the ancient lake, so that it could not have been the feeder, unless the lake existed in an inter-glacier period, when the climate was milder, the ice-cap smaller than at present, and the source of the Tasman higher up the valley. Supposing it was not filled by the Tasman river, it seems to follow that, at the t'me of the existence of the lake, the great trunk glacier formed by the junction of the Hooker and Tasman glaciers must have filled up the centre of the valley, and extending far away down beyond the terraces, formed the dam. which banked up the drainage of the hills above the terraces,