232 GLACIAL ACTION IN AUSTRALASIA. 



examined the classical locality at Hallett's Cove, informs me that 

 he thinks it not improbable that the glaciated rocks extend under 

 the Marine Tertiaries at Hallett's Cove. This question will no 

 doubt be settled during the present Session of the Association. 



II.— NEW ZEALAND. 



By Captam F. W. Hiitton. 

 Plate I. 



Although there is a large mass of ice in the old crater of 

 Ruapehu (8,878ft.) in lat. 39° 12', it is not a true glacier, for 

 accumulation is prevented by melting at the present crater, and no 

 marks of ancient glaciers have ever been found on Ruapehu or in 

 any other part of the North Island. These are confined to the 

 South Island alone. 



At the present day the most northerly glaciers in New Zealand 

 are on Mount Armstrong, Mount Greenlaw, and Mount Rolleston, 

 at the head of the Waimakariri River, in about lat. 42° 53', the 

 terminal faces of which are not less than 4,000ft. above the sea. 

 The most southerly are a few small ones round the head of the 

 Ai-thur River, which runs into Milford Sound in lat. 44° 40'. The 

 largest glacier in New Zealand is the Tasman, eighteen mdes in 

 length, and averaging somewhat imder two in breadth, with its 

 terminal face about 2,500ft. above the sea. On the western side 

 of the mountains, however, the Francis Joseph glacier comes down 

 to about 950ft., and the Fox glacier to within 6o0ft. of the sea level 

 in about lat 43° 30'. All these glaciers come from the highest 

 group of mountains in the Alps. Further southward, as the 

 mountains become lower, the glaciers become smaller and their 

 tenninal faces are at considerably greater altitudes. 



Ancient glacier-marks are numerous in the South Island, but 

 their geographical distribution differs much from those of the 

 present day. These ancient glacier-marks are, no doubt, of 

 various ages, but it is difficult to correlate them, and it is uncertain 

 whether they form a continuous and diminishing series fi-om the 

 earliest records to the present day, or whether there have been two 

 or more periods of marked extension of the glaciers. If rouk 

 basins be taken as evidence of the former presence of ice, then 

 the old lake basins of central Otago — the Maniototo plains and 

 the valleys of the Ida-burn and Manuherikia — will be among the 

 most ancient of our ice-marks ; but as the glacial origin of these 

 old lake basins is disputed it will be better to omit them here. 



Another supjjosed evidence of very ancient ice in Otago is the 

 breccia at Henley, near the mouth of the Taieri River."^^ This 



* Hutton, Ueolosy of Otago, Dunedin, 1875, p. 62, and Hector, Reports of Geological 

 Explorations during 1890-91, p. Iv. 



