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TRANSACTIONS 



OP THE 



NEW ZEALAND INSTITUTE, 



18 7 7. 



I.— MISCELLANEOUS. 



Art, I. — yew Zealand a Pust-ijlacial Centre of Creation. 

 By T. H. CocKBURN-HooD, F.G.S. 



[Bead before the Wellington PhiHsojjhical Society, 2th December, 187G.] 

 Capt.un Hutton, in a x^aper wliicli appears iu tlie last volume of the 

 " Transactions of tlie N.Z. Institute," has shown that the presumed cause 

 of the shrinking of the glaciers of the New Zealand Alps to their present 

 from their ancient colossal dimensions, is more than "a shrewd guess," 

 and that the examination of its former and existing littoral marine fauna, 

 goes far to prove that it was due — not to a change of climate during a 

 period of Southern Polar Glaciation — hut to the diminished elevation of 

 that Cordillera, combmed with other influences, of which presently. He 

 concludes his remarks with the following observation, "the evidences 

 seem to be in favour of there never having been a Glacial Epoch in New 

 Zealand, and consequently none in the Southern Hemisphere :" that is 

 to say, that there never was a period when a general ice-cap covered 

 these islands as it does the greater part of Greenland to-day, and as so 

 many deem it an established fact that, pressing down from polar regions, 

 a well nigh universal one overwhelmed the whole of nearly both hemis- 

 pheres in post-pliocene times^against part of which theory New Zealand 

 may be deemed to present very strong evidence. 



The term "glacial" is a most convenient one by which to designata 

 those periods of intense cold to which, m then* turn, various portions of 

 existing lands are now, and have in all time past been subjected from local 

 causes which admit of explanation, as well as from others affecting broad 

 belts stretching, now in one meridian, now in another, towards the tropics, 

 which may hereafter be understood. 



