396 Scientific Intelligence — Geology. 



peared, although its approach was indicated by the occasional rend- 

 ing of trees with a loud noise. Such a phenomenon, in a most 

 serene moonlight night, was quite new to us all. At length, 

 the rushing sound of waters and loud cracking of timber, an- 

 nounced that the flood was in the next bend. It rushed into our 

 sight, fflitterino; in the moonbeams, a movino' cataract, tossing before 

 it ancient trees, and snapping them against its banks. It was pre- 

 ceded by a point of meandering water, picking its way, like a thing 

 of life, through the deepest parts of the dark, dry, and shady bed, of 

 what thus again became a flowing river. By my party, situated as 

 we were at that time, beating about the country, and impeded in our 

 journey, solely by the almost total absence of water, suffering exces- 

 sively from thirst and extreme heat, I am convinced the scene never 

 can be forgotten. Here came at once abundance, the product of 

 storms in the far-off mountains that overlooked our homes. My 

 first impulse was to have welcomed this flood on our knees, for the 

 scene was sublime in itself, while the subject — an abundance of 

 water sent to us in the desert — ^greatly heightened the effect to our 

 eyes. Suffice it to say, I had witnessed nothing of such interest in 

 all my Australian ti'avels. Even the heavens presented something 

 new, at least uncommon, and therefore in harmony with this scene ; 

 the variable star rj Argus had increased to the first magnitude, just 

 above the beautiful constellation of the southern cross, which slightly 

 inclined over the river, in the only portion of sky seen through the 

 trees. That very red star, thus rapidly increasing in magnitude, 

 might, as characteristic of her rivers, be recognised as the star of 

 Australia, when Europeans cross the line. The river gradually 

 filled up the channel nearly bank high, while the living cataract tra- 

 velled onward, much slower than I had expected to see it ; so slowly, 

 indeed, that more than an hour after its first arrival the sweet music 

 of the head of the flood was distinctly audible from my tent, as the 

 murmur of waters and the diapason crash of logs travelled slowly 

 through the tortuous windings of the river bed. I was finally lulled 

 to sleep by that melody of living waters, so grateful to my ear, and 

 evidently so unwonted in the dry bed of the thirsty Macquarie. 

 Thermometer at sunrise, 47°; at noon, 79° ; at 4 p.m., 88° ; at 9, 

 63° — .with wet bulb, 57°. — (Lieutenant-Colonel Sir T. L. Mitchell, 

 Kt., on Tropical Australia, p. 56.) 



GEOLOGY. 



5. The Glacial Theory not abandoned by its author, Professor 

 Agassiz.- — In some influential quarters in this country, and also on 

 the Continent of Europe, it is believed that Professor Agassiz has 

 abandoned his famous and ingenious glacial theory ; but the fol- 

 lowing extract from a valuable work, entitled. Principles of Zoo- 

 logy, just published by Agassiz, shews that this belief is unfounded : — 



