Pakk. — Leith Valley Moraines. 445 



annual precipitation less, the terminal face of the glacier ice 

 is seldom found below 2,500 ft. 



An examination of the present physical features of the 

 country affords abundant evidence that the present glaciers 

 are but mere remnants of ice-masses that once covered 

 hundreds of square miles, in many places reaching even to the 

 sea. 



In Nelson we have the great tumbled moraines blocking 

 the lower ends of Lakes Kotoroa and Eotoiti ; in Canterbury, 

 the marvellous ice-cut terraces on the mountains north of 

 Lake Ohau, and the well-preserved terminal moraines on the 

 plains south of the same lake ; and, in Otago, the strikingly 

 beautiful rounded or billowy ice-worn foot-hills of the Matuki- 

 tuki, in the Upper Wanaka, the gigantic moraine blocking 

 the old outlet of Lake Wakatipu at Kingston, and the great 

 ice-shorn plateau of Central Otago, through which the Taieri 

 has cut its narrow tortuous course. 



Naturally enough, the most abundant and most obvious 

 evidences of former glaciation are to be found in the vicinity 

 of the present-day glaciers, on the ground the glaciers have 

 passed over twice, once in advancing and once in retreating. 



On the other hand, there is nothing to show that New 

 Zealand ever experienced a glacial period corresponding to 

 the Ice Age of the Northern Hemisphere. The evidences of 

 glacier action just mentioned show clearly enough that ice- 

 masses of huge size must have occupied a very large portion 

 of southern Otago and Southland in Pliocene or Pleistocene 

 times ; and it seems equally clear that an extension of the 

 present glaciers seaward would explain the origin and source 

 of these ice-masses. 



Up to the present time no traces of glaciation have been 

 found in the North Island. The continuous and widespread 

 series of older and newer Pliocene strata in the Wanganui, 

 Wellington, and Hawke's Bay districts, with their ,rich 

 assemblage of marine forms, proves the existence of long- 

 continued sedimentation in shallow seas, teeming with life, 

 at a period when the great ice-plough was scooping out the 

 valleys of Otago. The circumstance that probably 98 per- 

 cent, of this varied fauna is represented by living forms 

 shows that the climate in Pliocene times was neither 

 warmer nor colder than at present. 



I do not propose to minutely discuss the causes which led 

 to the refrigeration necessary to permit the great extension of 

 the glaciers of Otago in Pliocene times. This subject has 

 already been exhaustively dealt with by Sir James Hector, 

 Captain Hutton, and others. It will be sufficient to state 

 that the former believed, as the result of his explorations 

 among the West Coast Sounds of Otago in 1863, that an 



