^•^PV'l Field Naturalists' Club — Proceedings. 67 



1916 J 



Australasia has yet produced, and Mr. R. A. F. Murray, a 

 former Government Geologist of Victoria. With a pack-horse 

 bearing the bare necessaries of life, these venturesome men 

 mapped and plotted down and made known the physical 

 features and geological structure of the greater part of alpine 

 Gippsland. So thoroughly did they do their w^ork, in the face 

 of natural difficulties whose magnitude few nowadays are in 

 a position to realize that, when the cormtry had been settled 

 and tolerably cleared, little was left for those who came after 

 them to supplement or rectify. 



In depicting, by means of a series of lantern slides, the 

 structural and physical features of the country passed over 

 in a journey by the most accessible route from Heyfield 

 up the Macalister and Wellington Rivers to the Wellington 

 plateau, some 5,000 feet above sea-level, the author men- 

 tioned that the plateau was composed, for the most part, 

 of reddish and purplish sandstones, conglomerates, shales, 

 and porphyritic rocks, of supposed Carboniferous age, and 

 had been deeply dissected by the corrosive action of water. 

 In one of the V-shaped valleys thus formed, and at a 

 depth of over 2,000 feet below the crest of Mount Welling- 

 ton, nestles the alpine tarn, Lake Karng, having an area 

 of about 22 acres and a depth of 150 feet. The lake, though 

 known to the aboriginals, was first discovered by a stock- 

 man named Snowden in 1886, and since then has been visited 

 by many people either from motives of curiosity or for scientific 

 investigation. A difference of opinion exists as to the cause, 

 or combination of causes, responsible for its formation. The 

 late Dr. A. W. Howitt was disposed to assign its origin either 

 to landslip or glacial action. Others maintain that it is the 

 result of a huge mass of rock that slid down from a peak 

 opposite Mount Wellington, and infilled the valley for a mile 

 to the depth of 500 feet or thereabouts, impounding tlie waters 

 of the Nigothoruk Creek ; whilst some disagree with both theories 

 and argue that there is no evidence to show how it was formed. 

 There is no indication of the waters of the lake having at any 

 time overflowed the barrier, but they issue freely from it 

 some 500 feet below the crest. The agistment rights of the 

 l)lateau, it was mentioned, are leased by the Government 

 at a nominal rate. During the summer and autumn months, 

 when feed is scanty in the plain country, cattle to the number 

 of over 1,000 head are driven up to the plateau for pasturage, 

 and allowed to remain till the first fall of snow. Devastating 

 fires, which rage for weeks up and down the wooded slopes of 

 the ranges, destroying thousands of pounds' worth of timber 

 and innumerable species of our fauna and flora, were often wil- 

 fully caused for the selfish purpose of increasing the pasturage. 



