INTRO D UCTION. 1 7 



Pleistocene and perhaps in the newer Pliocene. The evidence 

 for the third depression consists of raised beaches and marine 

 fossiliferous beds in the southern part of the North Island. We 

 also know that Cook's Strait was in existence in the Pleistocene 

 period, because the species of Moas found in the peat-bogs and 

 alluvial deposits of the South Island are specifically different 

 from those found in the North Island. 



So we have the older Cretaceous, the Eocene, and the older 

 Pliocene as periods during which New Zealand may have been of 

 much larger dimensions than it is now. 



The Cretaceous fossils have not yet been described except 

 the plants. These differ much from those of Australia, but as 

 Baron von Ettingshausen, who described them, had a very limited 

 acquaintance with the existing flora of New Zealand, the names 

 he has given to the fossils cannot always be relied upon as 

 accurate. It is, however, evident that we have here the basis of 

 our present Phanerogamous flora ; and, if this is the case, it is a 

 proof that the New Zealand mountains have not been totally 

 submerged since the older part of the Cretaceous period. 



A Unio has been found at the Malvern Hills, which may be 

 taken as a proof of land communication between New Zealand 

 and some other country in the lower Cretaceous period, for Unio 

 is not known in any oceanic island. 



With the plants and the fresh-water Unio no doubt there came 

 a number of land animals, although we have not found any of 

 their remains. Probably they were land mollusca, insects of 

 various orders, myriapods and worms, but no vertebrates except 

 Sphenodon. 



The known Oligocene and Miocene faunas consist chiefly of 

 marine mollusks, which differ very much from the contempora- 

 neous mollusca of Australia. One remarkable peculiarity is that 

 we have in the Miocene sixteen species of shallow-water inverte- 

 brates, which are also found in the Miocene of Patagonia, imply- 

 ing a shallow-water communication between the two countries. 

 Many of the Mollusca are very large, much larger than those 

 inhabiting the New Zealand coasts at the present day, so that we 

 must suppose that the sea in the Miocene period was warmer 

 than it is now. 



Pectunculus laticostatus and Dosinia grayi, which are Eocene 

 only in Australia, first appeared in New Zealand in the Miocene, 

 and still live there. Typhis is Eocene in Australia, Miocene in 



c 



