612 Transactions. 



The evidences of glacial erosion are perhaps seen to better advantage 

 on the west side of the Tokomairiro Plain than elsewhere in Otago. The 

 panorama of ice-worn slope, rounded dome, mammillated ridge and hum- 

 mock, as seen from the summit or slopes of Mount Misery, near Milton, is 

 unsurpassed by anything in the Wakatipu district, or by anything I know 

 of in Scotland or England. 



Briefly stated. Dr. Marshall's fourth criterion postulates that the area 

 covered by ice is grooved and ice-worn ; and no one, I think, will be found 

 to dispute it. Further on he admits that the Taieri Moraine was formed 

 by an ice-sheet or glacier that descended from the highlands between the 

 watershed of the Taieri and Clutha rivers. 



The pertinent question is, does he deny the competency of this 

 particular ice - sheet to erode the surface over which it flowed ? Did it 

 present an exception to the general law ? I have, I think, sufficiently 

 proved that the surface over which it flowed is, as we should naturally 

 expect, deeply glaciated, and the evidence is there for every one to see. 



(5.) Boulders of rock foreign to the locality would be found in great 

 nxmibers in positions where they could not have been de- 

 posited by streams that formerly existed, or on prehistoric 

 sea-benches. 



I have already quoted references from Sir Archibald Geikie and Pro- 

 fessor Salisbury to show that the rocks in boulder-clays are of local origin. 

 A large proportion of the boulders in the Taieri Moraine consists of rocks 

 carried from the west side of the basin. The absence of foreign rocks in 

 this moraine has not been held by Hector, McKay, or Hutton to be proof 

 of its non-glacial origin. No rocks foreign to New Zealand have yet been 

 found in the coastal moraines, and I think it improbable that such will 

 ever be found. Geikie has shown that the pressure of the land -ice de- 

 scending from the Scottish Highlands thrust the Scandinavian ice-sheet, 

 flowing over the North Sea, away from the shores of Scotland ; and it is 

 certain that the Otago land-ice would in the same manner thrust the in- 

 vading polar ice away from our shores. 



Dr. Marshall states that diligent search for eight years has failed to 

 show him on the coastal hills of Otago any of the evidences of glaciation 

 that I have shown to be so abundant in the Wakatipu region. Perhaps, 

 after all, this is not surprising when we remember that such veteran 

 geologists as Sir Charles Lyell, Sir Roderick Murchison, Sir Andrew C. 

 Ramsay, and Dr. Buckland failed to observe the widespread and con- 

 spicuous evidences of glacial action in Scotland until these were first 

 brought under their observation by Agassiz. 



The glaciation of northern Europe was at first denied by zoologists. 

 It was claimed that an advance of the polar ice would have caused an 

 overlapping of Arctic, Sub-arctic, and Temperate faunas. That some such 

 overlapping did take place appears to have been established. Be that as 

 it may, the difficulties of the zoologists have long since been rem^oved. 



The glaciation of the South Island and of a large portion of the North 

 Island wdll doubtless present difficulties to the biologist. What these diffi- 

 culties are I cannot suggest. All that I can do is to record the evidences 

 of an ancient glaciation that occurred on a scale so great as to suggest that 

 the South Island was a centre of movement from which the ice - sheet 

 descended to the sea, in the southward direction probably meeting the 

 advancing polar ice. 



