444 Transactions. — Geology. 



here; and not only in New Zealand, but on the shores of 

 the Commonwealth of Australia. It has been shown that the 

 secular movements are so quiet and slow as to produce no 

 appreciable alteration from day to day or ye&v to year. They 

 often require a lapse of several generations to be capable of 

 proof by careful measurement ; hence the sooner the marks 

 are erected the earlier will the data be available in the future. 

 The proofs of upheaval and subsidence are sometimes ob- 

 tainable over wide continental areas, but generally are marked 

 by a local and variable character ; hence, marks should be 

 erected on the shores of all our harbours, on the headlands 

 and outlying projections of land. The work has a high scien- 

 tific and economic importance, and would naturally fall to the 

 State Department of Lands and Surveys. It could, perhaps, 

 be most conveniently carried on simultaneously with the 

 magnetic survey of the colony now in progress. The marking 

 of the coasts of Australia should be undertaken by the Federal 

 Government, so as to obtain uniformity in the method of 

 determining a mean sea-level datum. Up till now no serious 

 attempt has yet been made to determine the relation of sea- 

 level to tbe land in New Zealand on a scientific basis, and for 

 this reason the marking of the coast-line with stones, whose 

 position has been accurately determined with respect to sea- 

 level, would further supply a much-needed datum of verifica- 

 tion for the officers of the Lands and Survey Department for 

 their more exact geodetic and hydrographical surveys. 



Art. XLII. — Notes on some Glacier Moraines in the Leith 



Valley, Dunedin. 



By Professor James Park, F.G.S., Director, Otago University 



School of Mines. 



[Read before the Otago Institute, 12th November, 1901.] 



Plates XXVII .-XXVIII. 



The glaciers of New Zealand are reputed to be the largest in 

 existence outside the polar regions, with perhaps the excep- 

 tion of some in the higher Himalayas. They are found 

 clinging to both flanks of the " main divide " of the South 

 Island, their greatest development being within the Province 

 of Canterbury. On the West Coast they descend to within 

 750 ft. of sea-level, into the midst of the evergreen forest. 

 On the east side, where the slope is more gradual and the 



